Archives for June 2014

Today is a horrifying day in the history of the United States of America. Today, our Supreme Court ruled 5-4 in favor of Hobby Lobby that a privately held company can avoid covering women’s contraception if doing so collides with the company’s religious beliefs.

Let’s think about this in an over-arching way first. We are saying that companies, corporations, have religious beliefs AND rights. We are saying that a company can distinguish between what it will cover and what it will not cover, but only where women are concerned.

This is disturbing enough.

What I wonder about are the implications for women like me who use “birth control” as a form of hormone replacement therapy. Companies can proclaim in grandiose statements that they will not cover contraception for a woman, but in doing so they are also preventing women from getting the hormonal support they need in the wake of problems like infertility. A woman who cannot access HRT is more prone to organ failure, and that is just the tip of the iceburg. Of course, it would be difficult for a woman to stand up and explain this today, in an era when candidates for the Presidency advise women to just hold an aspirin between their legs to avoid pregnancy. With an audience like that, how can you explain the endocrine system and why some women need to take pills to help their systems work properly?

I wonder about where we go from here. If it is ok for companies to refuse to cover this part of a woman’s health, what could they refuse to cover next? Maybe they will proclaim that they shouldn’t have to pay for a woman’s annual PAP test or breast exam because, I dunno, that’s just all yucky womanly stuff, and hey, if a woman gets cancer it’s probably because she did something to anger God, right? Maybe maternity leave will be the next to go. I mean, it’s not the company’s fault that a woman decided to get pregnant. Besides, isn’t the next logical step to remind women that we should be staying home minding the kids anyway? If you want to have kids stay home all the time, not just the first few months.

I wonder what will be deemed permissible by our ruling body next. Maybe women shouldn’t be allowed to run for office anymore. That 5-4 decision would have probably been less close if those pesky women hadn’t been around, right? And women politicians? We all know everything went downhill politically when women like Hillary Clinton and Elizabeth Warren started popping up. Maybe women shouldn’t vote anymore, because they tend to vote for those women politicians.

I’d love to say this is all just hyperbole, but you know, I am really starting to wonder. Who would have thought that less than 100 years after women finally got the right to vote we would have to be clawing our way to have rights in the face of companies that now claim religious beliefs. It sounds like something out of The Onion. Maybe we have all entered into an Onion Universe. That would at least explain a day like today. Nothing else seems to be doing the trick.

This past weekend I spent some time in Nashville, Tennessee, for a trade show. On the first day, before the show began, my parents and I decided to venture out to The Hermitage, home of President Andrew Jackson. The museum and the tour paid careful attention to the legacy of slavery on the planation, which I thought was encouraging. As you are walking up the path to the mansion, for example, the audio tour notes that back in 1837 the whole area would have been a cotton field and you would definitely have seen slaves working in those fields. These are no-brainer facts, but it’s important that Americans incorporate these ugly truths into the romanticized stories of past heroes.

That being said, another key aspect of Jackson’s life and career went unmentioned and unnoticed. No where did I see any mention of the fact that part of Jackson’s legacy is that he helped to completely crippled the “5 civilized tribes” of Native Americans who up until his Presidency had mostly lived peacefully in the Southeast. Those five tribes were the Cherokee, the Chickasaw, the Creek, the Choctaw, and the Seminoles. Jackson was a notorious proponent of Indian removal, and while the Cherokee marched on the Trail of Tears under Martin van Buren’s Presidency, the foundation of that trail was set during Jackson’s term as President. This entire aspect of Jackson’s Presidency lies untouched at his home. Why?

Lately there has been a lot of talk about sports teams who use names like “Indians” or “Redskins.” That’s great, but are you aware of some of these statistics?

“American Indians and Native Alaskans number 4.5 million. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, these Americans earn a median annual income of $33,627. One in every four (25.3 percent) lives in poverty and nearly a third (29.9 percent) are without health insurance coverage.”  via http://www.spotlightonpoverty.org/

“A recent class action suit alleged that the government mismanaged billions of dollars in Indian assets. The case settled in 2009 for $3.4 billion—far less than what was lost by the feds.” via Forbes

“One-quarter of Indian children live in poverty, versus 13 percent in the United States. They graduate high school at a rate 17 percent lower than the national average. Their substance-abuse rates are higher. They’re twice as likely as any other race to die before the age of 24. They have a 2.3 percent higher rate of exposure to trauma. They have two times the rate of abuse and neglect. Their experience with post-traumatic stress disorder rivals the rates of returning veterans from Afghanistan.” via Washington Post

What it seems like to me is that we are not just brushing American history under the rug where whites and Native Americans are concerned – we are simply brushing all Native Americans under the rug. If we don’t see them and we don’t witness their difficulties, then fighting to get a logo changed can certainly seem like ample effort. Right?

There are Native Americans alive today whose great-grandparents fought Custer. The massacre at Wounded Knee, the massacre of Black Kettle and his tribe, the abuse of Chief Joseph and the Nez Perce, all happened towards the end of the 19th century. That’s not that long ago, but the sands of time are threatening to bury it all, and we are letting it happen.

When will we be able to face the fact that Andrew Jackson was not just a slave-owner but also an Indian killer? When will we recognize that many Civil War heroes, including Sheridan and Sherman, went out West and declared that the only good Indian was a dead Indian? There are people alive today who were sent to schools in the East to get rid of their Native American culture. They were prohibited from speaking their native language. They were not allowed to keep their sacred possessions. Are we going to continue to sweep them under the rug too?

I am deeply concerned that we are going to simply turn a blind eye to our history and to our present where Native Americans are concerned. When will the battle end? When will we come to terms with what has happened on this “land of the free?” Huge portions of our population are still waiting.

For the last several weeks I’ve finally been doing the smart thing – I’ve been catching up on Dr. Who (just starting with 2005). Last night I watched an episode during which The Doctor has a chance to finally tell someone he loves that he loves them. The moment is perfect. She’s waiting for it. You’re waiting for it. But instead he says, “Does it really need saying?”

I think a lot of people have been in a position where, given the opportunity to say, “I love you,” they instead say something completely hokey or maybe even something kind of mean to deflect away from the situation. The reasoning is almost always the same. To the person, it is obvious that they love the other person. Why does saying it make it any more real or meaningful?

There are three reasons why I feel strongly that it does need saying.

Humans are insecure and self-absorbed

OK, that’s not a very nice thing to say, but as a species, let’s face it…it’s pretty darned true. We are just sure that in the grand scheme of the universe, we are wastes of space. We also are obsessed with anything having to do with making us feel better about ourselves. With that activity keeping us busy, and with our lack of confidence in the affection of other people, is it any wonder that we might miss the signs that seem so obvious to others? As a friend once told me, getting up and getting someone a glass of juice will not be universally translated as “I love you.” They had a point. We need to say the words not just so the person feels loved but also so that they don’t have to guess anymore.

Saying the words is brave

It was poignant that the Doctor could not make himself say the words. He faces all kinds of fierce opponents throughout the series. He is known throughout the universe. But a letter and two words – he couldn’t make it happen. I envision saying “I love you” like you are giving someone a little piece of your heart to hold in their hands. You are saying, with those 3 words, “OK, look, I am fully invested in your well-being. When you are glad I’ll be glad, and when you are sad I’ll be sad, but I’ll try to make you feel better too, and I want to enjoy the good times with you.” That’s a lot. And you know, it almost seems foolish. We give other people the chance to hold a bit of our heart in their hands? There is so much risk! They could squish it up. They could drop it and just leave it on the ground. Something could happen to them and our heart could break. Geeze. Who wants to go through all of that? Yes, saying “I love you” is brave. Only the bravest can do it, but bravery can be developed.

You might not get a chance tomorrow

This particular scene in Doctor Who was especially heart-wrenching because it was the last chance he had to tell this person he loved them. He knew that going in and still asked, “Does it really need saying?” Of course as humans we never know when our last chance is. When I was a little kid, I called my grandma to ask if I could spend the night and she ended up talking to my mom. Later that day, my grandma had a massive asthma attack that ultimately ended up taking her life. My mom always said that I had done something great – by calling my grandma I had let my mom say “I love you” one last time. Any conversation, online or offline, could be your last. That sounds dire, but it really is true. Why gamble when saying the words takes only a few seconds and means so much to you as well as to the person you love?

Does it really need saying? Oh yes. Every time. Every possible occasion. We need to tell the people we love that we love them. You can never say it too much. You can never assume you’ll get another chance.

Yes. It really needs saying.

Image Credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/bevgoodwin/12065654826 via Creative Commons