Building Community Electoral Politics

This is a post for story telling and personal reflection, an occasion for emotion as well as reason. Tell the rest of us about your experiences with electoral politics and your feelings about it.

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On the first Tuesday of November, when I was nine years old, my mom woke me at 6:30 in the morning like she did every Election Day.  Hand in hand, we walked down 89^th street, down 88^th street, and across Lexington Avenue to RFK High School, a public middle school for students with learning disabilities, the historic site of the performance of our civic responsibility.  Just as we had done for years before, we split up this momentous endeavor: my mom signed in and I got to vote.  We walked into the voting booth, our private enclave where we would make our voices heard.  Although the task was big, I knew exactly what to do. I had done it many times before.  Tuning out my mother’s distracting commentary, I focused in on the enabler of my civic contribution, the lever.  I took hold of the giant red handle and pulled with all of my might.  Afterward, I turned to my mom joyfully expecting a celebration of my contribution to our country.  Instead her expression was horrified.  Hannah, she said sternly, you just lost our voice, your ruined our vote, now if our candidates lose, we will blame ourselves.  In my excitement about the electoral process, I had forgotten a crucial step: to cast our votes. 

The weighted significance to which my mom attributed our voting ritual captures the political atmosphere of my home.   Politics in the Gross household were not a matter to be taken lightly.  Our liberal political views were values that symbolized our family.  We were proud of our democratic support, proud that my parents’ business careers did not hamper our desire for the government to provide resources to all citizens, proud that we supported a woman’s right to choose, proud that our family had been liberal for generations, and proud that we lived in a community that was so intelligent that everyone shared our exact same views.

I came to Amherst determined to retain my family’s political activism and to promote the political beliefs that, to me, were an assertion of my family’s values.  I joined campus democrats, bonded with my classmates over our shared love for Obama (and for Michelle’s sartorial choices), and tried to infuse my liberalism into class discussions.  But, to my naïve surprise, unlike New York where everyone’s political views mirrored my own, at Amherst I encountered an enormous variety of political beliefs.  I had expected to meet students who were more conservative than I was, but the idea of a more liberal person was unfathomable to me.

 In the fall of my freshman year I took a class called Changing America.  My professor labeled herself not as a liberal but as a leftist.  What did that mean?  I had only heard of leftists in the context of foreign communists in my high school history classes.  The reading, my professor, my classmates, and our discussions exposed me to aspects of politics that I had never heard of.  Looking at American politics and government from a sociological and revisionist historian perspective, I learned about the perpetuation of racism through our color-blind policies, that there were only limited differences in the Republican and democratic parties’ policies on the international arena, that by vacationing in the Caribbean my family was not supporting the local economy through tourism, but was preventing locally-generated sustainable economic growth.

The course left me feeling at once enlightened and confused.  The arguments that my professor and classmates made were compelling: clear and substantiated, the perspective that I gained through the course was impossible to dismiss.  But in accepting political views different from my own, I also felt a pang of remorse.  Because my family was so political, abandoning our shared values felt like a rejection of our familial beliefs.  This conflict illuminated how strongly political beliefs and emotions intertwined.  My politics were not simply a reflection of ideals I believed in, but were rooted in history: both the American historical narrative and my own.  Taking the course was an important lesson in learning to reconsider my previously held beliefs.  My mom was right in her stern reaction to my nine year-old voting mishaps.  I couldn’t solely rely on tradition to remember when to pull the lever in the voting booth.  I have to cast my ballot first.   

I grew up in the super liberal city of Newton, MA., where to be a republican was to be an outcast. This was always a little bit of an irony to me for all the rhetoric of inclusion, acceptance, and coexistence that I was taught over the course of growing up there. The schools itself did not teach that the liberal mindset was "right", but then again, it definitely didn't have to. The Community took care of that part of my education, through a much more complex system of adult peer pressure that I'm sure my parents endured for being independents and fiscal conservatives in a city brimming with highly energized liberals, and a peer pressure that my peers and myself felt through the polotics that we no-doubt pick up from our most trusted information sources: our parents.

The irony comes into play when we actively accept all creeds, colors, ethnicities, cultures, needs, and eating habits, but if you say that you think the city is spending too much on it's $200 million public high school project, and be prepared for some questions. If you say anything good about Bush, you might be shunned. The community culture was a highly political one, whcih encouraged "speaking your mind" and being active in politics. This, combined with the fact that Newton is also unevenly populated with liberal politics, meant that it was hugely prone to a groupthink mentality, and that part of being in the Newton community was being part of that same political community.

These two communities, held such a strong parallel with each other, that it seemed Newtonites partly defined themselves on that political ideology, NOT on freedom of thought, or discussion, or the full spectrum of values out there. In this way, Electoral politics in Newton gets hugely effected I think, becasue my peers and I, having grown up in this community and wanting to belong somewhere, also were pressured to accept this characteristic of being part of the community; That being politically active, and in this case, finding activiity probably only in liberal circles. 

I think that in some places - Newton being a prime example - community, replicating itself in its youth, helps to replicate its politics just as well. Possibly at the cost of real choice in electoral politics...

I think that the general distrust in politics, politicians, anything political that I've observed in my communities contributed to my disinterest in the topic. In Korea, Burma, U.S., the distrust, although in varying degrees, seems to be prevalent in the community. Unmet expectations, unfulfilled promises, little consideration and respect for justice and fairness, and rampant double standards are perhaps some of the reasons why people came to develop such distrust. Ironically, many of us do not trust who we are to entrust for the protection and provision of our welfare. In Korea today, shrinking of the middle class, diminishing social mobility, and increase in umployment rates have increased the level of dissatisfaction amongst the citizens - only to be incited into and raging distrust for the politicans who have, despite such societal circumstances, been continuing to use their power to meet their personal needs. In Burma, fifty years of military rule has gradually developed strong distrust for the government; thus, today, as the newly elected leaders of Burma are proposing and enacting changes, there is a lot of suspcion and doubts to whether these changes are genuine and sustainable. 

Coming from such background, and being immersed in strong distrust, if not alienation from politics, I have not been previously detached and apathetic about the role it can play in changing the community. I think that such alienation developed as I was growing up in Burma, where politics - until very recently - was very much transfixed and resistent to any sort of change).

But these ideas have been gradually changing here in Amherst through two of the courses I'm taking this semester: Building Community and Political Economy of Development. I've always been aware of the potential role that politics play in developing a community, but I wasn't enthusiastic or necessarily curious about how it can be done. But these two courses are slowly allowing me to develop more personal connection and interest. If Political Economy of Development provides a bird's eye view of the society, with a central focus on those with political and economic power, Building Community takes a closer look at the narrative of the people, who are to be represented by those with power. The different angles at which the two disciplines look at the society give me a comprehensive view of the society. 

One of my favorite moments in class for this section was the "cake exercise." I think it was Ms. Mead who (half seriously, half jokingly) stated that democracy might not be the best option in certain circumstnaces. And we, through the exercise, have been able to consider the different alternatives, and consider pros and cons to the various ways. What struck me was that, people in Burma, due to the long miltary oppression, has developed strong antipathy against dictatorship, and (interestingly) consequentially developed a predilection for democarcy, more specifically for the American values of democracy. There have been people in Burma (more so before the changes that we're seeing today - I've been away, and thus been not able to witness the changes), who will ask the foreigners in a conversation, about when the American military will come to change Burma. I think that, especially at this critical time of period (assuming that the signs of change are genuine), it is vitally important for the leaders, for the people to reflect upon the values, and develop institutions according to them. So, how do we develop an awareness about the complexity of these issues and questions - on which the future of Burma is at stake? I've come to synthesize what I've learned this semester that the solution lies in education. Education not only provides leverage for the people to have their voices be heard, but also allows them to develop a more complex, and precise understanding of what kind of political representation and future they want for themselves. The "cake exercise" could be one of the more creative, and engaging ways in which we could raise discussions and educate the young about political/economic topics - that I wish to make use of, sometime in the future. 

The section about the signifiance and relevance of race in American politics, has inspired in me two questions. First, if there is racial diversity in America, there is ethnic diversity in Burma. And there are still some serious armed conflicts occuring between the ethnic groups. So, here, the questions is: when there is such conflict, do we try to find and meet the common needs of the two factions? Or, is "common need" an illusionary concept that we form in order to addresss the conflict in some way? The latter question has been provoked by the mediation training I'm participating with Duke FIscher, a trainer from NYC. He says that in mediation, we aren't trying to meet the needs of the two people/parties in conflict, but we are trying to recognize, respect, and meet the needs of respective needs. I'm not sure how this debate unravels in different real-life circumstances and would like to explore this further. Secondly, the issue of race in America led me to realize the relevance of race at a whole new level; now, I wonder how me being Korean - and trying to do social justice work in Burma - would be perceived and received. 

The discussions about electoral politics in America has not only given me a better understanding about the better understanding of the American society, but also (the nature of the varying levels of similarities and differences) has allowed me to reflect upon my own self, and my own cultural background. And most importantly, it has allowed me to realize the importance of the specific role that education can play in developing democratic values.  

During my semester abroad in Nicaragua, I was fortunate enough to live with an activist Sandinista family during a heated presidential election and have access to their opinions.  Two elements of the campaign seemed particularly relevant to me: 1) the use of emotionally evocative imagery and rhetoric during the campaign; and 2) the youth movement's enthusiasm.  

1. For many in the generation that saw firsthand 1979 Sandinista Revolution, the faces of that time period -- then-Comandante, now-Presidente Daniel Ortega; then-Comandante, now-Ambassador Tomás Borge; and then-Comandante Zero, now-Minister of Development Edén Pastora among them -- brought back the intense emotions of the July 19th triumph over the Somoza Dynasty after 45 years of brutal military dictatorship.  Even as an outsider, it was hard for me not to feel a bit of longing for a sort of utopian past lost during the 1980s Contra War.

2. Especially with the contrast between the strident rhetoric and bright colors of the Ortega/Sandinista campaign set against the 80 year-old Fabio Gadea and his monochromatic (in many senses) Alianza-Partido Liberal Independiente campaign, it was easy to see why many Nicaraguan youth -- and especially Managuan youth -- became very active in the Juventud Sandinista (Sandinista Youth) during the election season.  With weekly meetings in my host family's house, I could sense the hope that my neighborhood's chapter exuded for the future of the country under Daniel.  Much like the Obama campaign, the Sandinistas captured that generation's optimism -- with less regard for the probability of the government actually accomplishing those goals.

Still, among those swayed at the core by emotional arguments and symbols, there remained a cold rationality. When I asked my host mother what would happen if Daniel Ortega were to run for another term in five years, she responded, "No, we're not Cuba."  

Although it might never be known to what extent the official results of the election (over 60% for the Ortega) were fraudulent, the relative peacefulness that followed the election provides evidence to the claim that the Sandinistas' successful use of emotional arguments vastly outweighed the relatively unemotional compaints of the broad but disjointed opposition.

     My personal experiences with electoral politics are relatively limited.  In sixth and seventh grade, I was my year's class president in the student council, but I was never politically minded about it.  I was essentially someone who was responsible and easy to talk to who functioned as a middle man between my classmates and the administration.  I rejoined student council in my junior year of high school (as an unelected representative), but to be honest my main motivation was a need for more extracurricular activities to put on my college applications.  In two years, we accomplished nothing substantial.  Few people had any grand ideas, and our duties mainly consisted of organizing school dances.  It was not exactly thrilling.

     There has been a lot of talk lately about the Amherst Senate.  I have talked to people who feel disenfranchised and poorly represented, but I have many friends on Senate who work hard to try to prevent such feelings.  I myself try to stay out of it.  I tend to avoid conflict, and perhaps this has contributed to my general lack of involvement in electoral politics.  

     I had never been all that interested in national politics until my AP US Government class in high school.  My parents are political--they are each one of the only democrats in my midwestern conservative extended family, but they are not very vocal about their views.  They make sure that they are informed, but they never impressed a passion for politics on me in my childhood as the politically-oriented parents of some of my friends did.  During my senior year, I found that the more I understood the way electoral politics functioned, the more interesting I found it.  I was not able to vote in the 2008 election, but I really wanted to.  I found Obama to be an inspiring speaker.  His speeches spoke to many of the issues that were important to me, and I had a very emotional response.  I believe that this initial enthusiasm is what has made me feel somewhat disillusioned lately.  The intense partisanship in Congress, which seems to be getting worse and worse, necessitated so much compromise that by the time most measures finally got passed (if they did), they no longer resembled their original forms.  I wish our representatives at the national level would focus more on the issues and less on partisan politics.

I think, to be honest, that my involvement and interest in electoral politics peaked many years ago.  I payed a lot of attention to the 2004 presidential election, the 2006 presidential election, and definitely the 2008 presidential election.  I went to see Obama speak as he was campaigning in Connecticut during the primaries, registered to vote from another state, and watched Amherst campus pour onto the green as the votes were counted.  

Since then, Obama has gone back on a lot of his promises.  I don't blame him.  I'm sure he had to, in a rational political way.  I don't know whether I would have felt differently about electoral politics in another era, but in the past couple of years I have become really disinterested in electoral politics.  I don't really have any new or original critiques.  Money and corporate investment seem to dominate in contemporary U.S. politics.  Our representatives are not representative of the population, and mainstream politics tends to silence discussions of oppression within U.S. socieity.  Voting requirements, laws and practices exclude many groups that live in the country.  

I had a conversation with a friend today about a group he is working with on campaign finance reform.  I do believe that reforms in electoral politics could help to address some of these issues.  But I also feel that some of these issues are inherent to U.S. electoral politics.

Finally, I think that the representation of electoral politics as the dominant, and often only, legitimate form of political expression has served to repress other forms of political expression.  I think that that has been particularly evident in the rise and subsequent attacks upon Occupy Wall Street and affiliated movements.  One dominant discourse kept repeating support for the principles of the movement, a call for the movement to institutionalize itself in mainstream politics, and a criticism of its failure to do so.  I found the power of the movement to be exactly in its posing of itself as an alternative to mainstream politics, as a form of expression of political agendas in a refreshing, new, direct and more participatory way.

I don't intend to reject electoral politics entirely.  I do intend to vote in the upcoming elections.  I guess I don't feel that that is the most I can do to express myself as a political actor.

The political process has always enthralled me.  As long as I can remember, I would stay up as late as my parents would allow me to on election night so I could see the results come in.  I am a huge news junkie – I enjoy reading the newspaper, political websites, and (as of summer 2010) Twitter. 

I suppose I’m a social media evangelist, because I love Twitter and want everyone to know it.  It’s received an unfair rap among those who haven’t used it, or who use it “incorrectly” – I view Twitter as the future of news media.  Yes, some people use Twitter to report what they ate for breakfast, but many serious journalists and pundits use the site to relay pertinent and insightful information, as well.  Where else can you read the up to the minute reports and estimations of CBS News’s Mark Knoller, or the New York Times’s Nate Silver, or CNN’s Roland S. Martin, or Newark’s Mayor Cory Booker?  Twitter breaks down the barriers of television, radio, or print, because information is relayed spontaneously and succinctly.  Reporters tweet breaking news, pundits analyze the day’s stories, and politicians can connect directly with their constituents without a middleman. 

Twitter’s best feature, however, it its interactivity.  Anyone can “tweet” at anyone else, and I’ve had brief Twitter exchanges with established journalists.  Additionally, the ability to read threads of conversation between people from different sides of the aisle allows for de facto fact checking – any user with a substantial audience cannot say anything inaccurate without it being corrected by a chorus of thousands.  Trust issues are minimal, in my opinion.  Since I generally trust the opinion of our major media sources, I trust the reporters and columnists who operate under their auspices.  In fact, many of the major media organizations have official rules for their employees on Twitter, as employees’ Twitter accounts are an extension of the company’s brand and reputation.  News breaks on Twitter.  During any debate or primary this year, Twitter users have been the first to fact check candidates, report breaking news, and interpret results.  I’ll never watch a debate or election results without a smartphone in my hand again.

Until very recently, I was my every means apolitical. My father listened to the 5 o’clock news every single night as I was growing up, and watching political debates on CNN was one of his favorite things to do as well. Yet politics and current events were never a subject of discussion during dinner, and throughout high school I was largely uninterested in the things that we heard on the news. It seemed to me that news was always bad news, and I didn’t feel the least bit empowered to change the things that were going wrong in my community, in my city, or in the country. So for these reasons I chose to distance myself from electoral politics as much as possible.

College was definitely a turning point for me as far as electoral politics was concerned. I would often find myself sitting with a group of friends during dinner and having nothing useful or knowledgeable to contribute when the conversation veered towards political issues.  I started feeling that it had been rather ignorant of me to be so unaware, so uninvolved. So I began reading the New York Times, which was conveniently available every morning in the dining hall. And it was through reading the paper that I really began to develop my own opinions about political issues. Previously, I hadn’t thought to define my position on abortion, gay marriage, healthcare, the economy, or on public education. But the more I read about these issues, and the more familiar I got with the liberal and conservative approaches towards these issues, the more my own beliefs concerning these issues became clear to me. Emotion and reason both play a very strong role in deciding where I stand. On an emotional level, I get infuriated when people invoke the individualist ideology to justify decisions to cut down on welfare or public education spending. I get angry when people invoke their personal religious beliefs to prevent homosexual couples who may not even subscribe to these beliefs from getting married.  And it really bothers me when I hear about people being unwilling to pay higher taxes for fear that these taxes might benefit those from less privileged socioeconomic classes, who “aren’t working hard enough”. On a rational level, on the other hand, I am very willing to recognize that there are both sides to each of these debates.  I identify myself as a liberal and a Democrat but I am not opposed to conservative and Republican points of view. It feels to me like there is no single right answer for a lot of the political issues facing us today, and I don’t think that we should get caught up in defending our ideological beliefs and addressing all issues along party lines. Open discussion, a willingness to challenge our own beliefs, and a willingness to compromise on important issues is what I would really like to see happen.

But this isn’t what is happening on a local, statewide, or national level today. Compromise isn’t exactly what is going on between the Obama administration and their political opponents. And I find this to be rather disillusioning. In addition to that, even though I am more politically aware than I was a few years ago, I am legally unable to engage in electoral politics. I am a permanent resident, not an American citizen. This means that even though I have grown up in America, even though I have a stake in the political decisions that are made in our country, I am not allowed to vote. One day in the near future, I will be, and at that point I certainly plan on taking a more active role in electoral politics. Being aware of political issues is not enough; I feel I have a civic responsibility to actually get involved. When that time comes, however, I will have certain obstacles to overcome. I will have to be able to commit myself to one political position in cases where open discussion and compromise aren’t options. I will also have to face the aspects of politics that I dislike, such as the tendency to focus on the popularity contest between candidates during election season, as opposed to the actual issues that need to be addressed. In all honesty, the electoral political process is not a process that I enjoy, but it is a way of playing an active role in working towards social change. So for that reason, I would like to reverse the apolitical tendencies I had throughout high school and actually participate in electoral politics, once, of course, I can legally do so. 

Up until recently electoral politics had never really been a very important part of my life. Through my understanding that it is important to be involved in one’s community, I have taken it upon myself to do work in my and I hope to assert my right to have a say in my country through voting in the upcoming elections.  Though I was too young to vote in the past elections, I worked to help register students in my school to vote and now I am excited to have my say in my country. Though I was upset that I was unable to vote in the past elections, now that I think about it, it was probably a good thing because my vote wouldn’t have necessarily been my vote, but rather my family’s vote. 

            My mother is a very conservative Catholic, my step-father is an artist, and my father is a businessman, so growing up I have heard a large array of opinions ranging from taxes, to abortion, to governmental responsibilities for the poor and the elderly, and funding for education and the arts.  Listening to their mixed opinions helped me understand that there is much to consider in each candidate, but with all of their arguments and opinions I couldn’t decipher what exactly I wanted in a candidate, so I simply followed what my family wanted (though even at times they were not in agreement with that). I now find it tremendously important to do the research and figure out whom I want to represent my vote and what I want that person to do.

            Other than on a national scale with the presidential elections, I think it is also necessary to look at the electoral politics closer to us in our community.  After deciding how to divide the chocolate cake in class, I began to think about the smaller decisions that involve electoral politics that are more directly linked to us. Taking this idea into account I have tried to look at various ways in which we utilize electoral politics in our smaller communities.  Naturally, I began thinking of the Amherst Senate in which we elect representatives to argue for what we want in our school.  But going a bit further and trying to note the electoral politics in my groups of friends I began to see how common it is that we get together and vote on what time we want to go to dinner or if we want to order food and if so what kind of food. Though this isn’t set up with campaigns or long debates, we do argue what we want and suggest ideas and we usually end up doing what everyone votes for.  Everyone is entitled to their say and their vote and all are affected by the decision, even though it may be in a small way. Couldn’t it even be considered that our admissions process involves electoral politics?  Candidates send in their bios, resumes, transcripts, and other information to try to prove themselves worthy students to be admitted and then a panel (of elected members) sit together and decide and vote on who they think would be a positive representative of their school.  In many ways these admissions officers hand select who they wish to enter their community based on how they think each student will contribute to the well being of others as well as the world once they graduate. 

            Though it is natural for me to immediately turn to our national politics when thinking of electoral politics, after our activity in class I have tried to appreciate the small systems of electoral politics in our smaller communities. 

I come from a very interesting political background.  Because my parents divorced when I was two years old and my father hasn't lived in the country since I was three, my mother's political beliefs and philosophies have had a much larger influence on the development of my own beliefs and opinions, and as an extension of that, so have the politics of my mother's family in general.

My mom's family is from Eastern Massachusetts.  They have all been well-educated and politically involved for generations (a correlation which is definitely obvious).  Politics has always been a big part of my mother's life.  She and her siblings moved to Virginia when my grandfather took a job under President Nixon in the Justice Department, and moved back to Massachusetts when he resigned during the Saturday Night Massacre in Watergate.  Since then, my grandfather's political involvement has been more international (working as a US ambassador to the United Nations) and academic (working in the Kennedy School of Government).  My mother, as a law professor, has never been as politically involved, but has also done work with the United Nations.  When my mother's family comes together politics naturally become a part of our interactions - whether my mother and her siblings are engaging in friendly(ish) argument with my grandfather over their opinions on different issues (my grandfather, while liberal, is a registered Massachusetts Republican; reflecting on our move to New Mexico, my mother often says that "she moved from a state where the Republicans act like Democrats, to a state where the Democrats act like Republicans), asking our aunt after her son who works in the Obama administration, overhearing my grandfather talking on the phone to his friends in government around the world, or, since I was very little, listening to my grandfather's stories about all of his experiences in public service.  Even though we all don't have the same opinions, we all feel comfortable sharing them and challenging one another (my grandmother, unlike her husband, changed her registration from Republican to Independent so that she could vote for Obama in the MA primary), and politics definitely play a big role in the day to day life of my mother's family.

My father's family, on the other hand, is an entirely different story.  From rural Pittsburg-area Pennsylvania, my dad's family are not as highly educated as my mom's, are very Christian, and very culturally conservative.  However, unlike my mom's family, politics do not play a big role in their day-to-day life.  They are much more focused on their family (which is much larger than my mother's), their livelihoods, their neighborhoods, and their communities.  I'm assuming that my father's family is registered Republican, although I've never asked.  I don't really talk politics when we visit, mainly because it doesn't usually come up in conversation, but also because it's honestly a little bit uncomfortable.  Sometimes members of the family will make comments or jokes that are meant to be no big deal, but strike me as being racially offensive.  They don't make these comments intentionally, but live in a pretty homogenous community where these viewpoints are never challenged.  This means that they can hold lots of opinions (for example, those on immigration or gay rights) that strike me as ignorant and wrong, partly because they live in an environment where these are hardly challenged. I love my father's family: they are wonderful, caring, dignified people, and although I infrequently see them, they welcome me back whenever I do as though I had never left.  And yet our political opinions are polar opposites.  My political experience with my father's family is extremely emotional, and I think it has given me a better understanding of small-town conservative America, and that even while trends across the country seem to be progressing in a liberal way, there are large segments of our population that are culturally conservative and vote that way.  Because even though politics doesn't really play a role in their day-to-day lives, my father's family are very patriotic, and part of their value system is to vote.

I am grateful for the political heritage and perspective that both sides of my family have given me.  For the (more rational) intellectual curiosity and tradition of public service passed down from my mom's side, and the (more emotional) strong family and faith values (as well as larger perspective) passed down from my dad's.  My political identity comes from this.  While I don't think that my race has played a huge role in it (both of my parents being of the same race but of very different political stances), I think that my socioeconomic and educational opportunities, my religious beliefs, and my experiences living in ethnically, culturally, and socioeconomically diverse environments (in Africa and New Mexico) have helped to create my identity, political and otherwise.  Politics is something that is important to me and that excites me.  I have worked as an election clerk in two elections and voted for the first time on my 18th birthday, and am looking forward to voting absentee in the coming Presidential election (a democratic vote weighing much more in New Mexico than it does here).  But my political identity is still developing.

For some background, both of my parents were born outside of the United States. My mother was born in Haiti, and my father was born in Italy. They have both benefitted from higher education programs here in America, and have been big proponents of educational opportunities for all. That being said, they have encouraged me to be a registered voter (I was registered at soon as I turned 18), and have been somewhat influential in my own political perspectives.

One day when I was a senior in high school, I went to the grocery store with my mother. As we grabbed a cart and entered the fruit section, there was a volunteer campaigning for a new councilman who was looking to provide educational reform for the local middle school. The volunteer asked for any registered voters to sign a petition for school reform and for an additional signature to show support for the councilman. The volunteer approached my mom, and asked for her support. I attended the public middle school, and hated my experience there. My mom shared the sentiment and gladly put her name down while also signing for the councilman who we had meet at many town meetings. My mom carried on with her shopping, but I stood there, expecting the volunteer to ask me to sign next. She asked the gentleman behind me to sign, and seemed to dismiss me. After she realized I was still standing there, reading the flyer she had distributed to everyone walking past, she gave a look of disbelief. She said, “I apologize, but nobody your age ever wants to sign; let alone are they registered voters.” I assured her that not only was I registered to vote, that I wanted to see change in the local middle school.

I felt a mix of emotions. Originally, I was offended by how she disregarded me. In my eyes, my signature was equal to any one other person’s signature. But I realized, she must have felt frustrated, too. All of the younger people who she had previously tried reaching out to were either disinterested, not registered to vote, or not inclined in any sort of electoral politics at all. I saw how the system of voting can be both alluring in the sense that people can make profound change, but also disheartening in terms of participation (even though hundreds of people may care about an issue, only a handful may take a few minutes to show their support). That moment helped me understand the power and pitfalls of the electoral process system. I believe it is hard to get younger adults interested in politics, but if there are certain issues that can be used to spark one’s interest (at the time for me it was education), we should utilize and promote those to the youth so they can be active participants in electoral politics. 

I had always considered running for office in my schools’ student governments, but I think I quickly grew detached from the idea of it – first, because all the candidates’ campaign promises (microwaves in the lunchroom, new playgrounds, pizza Fridays) were completely unrealistic; second, because I knew that none of the campaign “issues” were all that important anyway.  I had a good head on my shoulders as a little kid.  I don’t think I necessarily knew what the important issues were for an elementary school, (though I can think of a few now that could’ve improved Crow Island School – addressing bullying, too much homework, insufficient focus on the arts), but I knew that those issues put forward by my politically-ambitious classmates – much like many of those put forward by politically-ambitious adults – were pretty insignificant in the grand scheme of things.  And it wasn’t until I was much older that my dad told me the story of his famous school-wide protest of the middle school cafeteria, where he successfully led a boycott demanding bagels and better hot dogs at lunch, that I learned how student-activism could make a difference.  But then again, he was a child of the 60’s, me of the 90’s, and those were two different times.

However, I certainly didn’t view myself as above political activity either.  Some people love to bash and criticize politics, over and over, and that’s never been me.  Rather, I’ve always held an interest in politics.  I grew up in a politically and socially active household.  The Alters engaged in politics in several ways.  It wasn’t necessarily through going to rallies or canvassing door-to-door, though we did that from time to time, but mostly through watching tv, reading newspaper, writing checks, participating in service, and belonging to our socially active synagogue.

I believe I am drawn to politics for both emotional and rational reasons.  On the emotional side, I’ll admit I like the celebrity of it, the allure of the leader, but also the indescribable feeling I get from hearing the inspirational rhetoric of an eloquent, impassioned speaker, and knowing that I am one of many feeling this same thing.  It makes me believe in the possibilities of myself and my community.  On the rational side, I started considering which specific policies provided better results and for whom, usually aligned with my parents’ beliefs, usually with a liberal lean, though not always.  I began to see how political decisions deliberated by distant political bodies affected peoples’ lives in tangible ways, and I began connecting the dots with how the electoral process could make those bodies seem just a little less distant.

Even still, I had a phase where I didn’t see how a man, even the as powerful a man as the President, could make that big a difference, given that there are so many people and events that shape the world.  But then the Iraq War happened, and that really changed my opinion here.  President Bush had authorized and strategized that war (and some might say invented it) and that decision of his has altered the courses of millions of American families, and millions more around the world.

Around that time, I also began to learn that these powerful leaders can and do truly come from humble beginnings.  In late-2003 my family hosted a community gathering for a little-known state senator who was trying to launch a campaign for the United States Senate.  He had roots in community organizing in Chicago and seemed to really connect with normal people, because he was one himself.  At the time, he was a darkhorse to win the Democratic primary, let alone the general election, but as the dominos fell and momentum built people were saying, dreamy-eyed, that he could be running for president as early as 2016.  The first time I had heard of this man, Barack Obama, was when I met him in my living room.

What inspired me most about Obama’s story was the idea of common people coming together to do uncommon things.  I think that is the promise of politics.  That lesson is embedded in his personal narrative, but also in the message he tried to make central to his campaign.  It’s the theme of looking out for each other and realizing that helping fulfill other people’s best interests can also be in your best interest – whether it has the reach of the nuclear family, the local community (as seen in the ggeh), or the broader national community (expressed through federal politics).

Dan’s comment in class today about how families or communities can be political even if not in the formal, most socially- accepted definition of the word, had me reconsider my family’s political involvement. I began to think more about my father’s decision to resist political involvement, despite his self-acknowledged potential in it, how I inherited this relationship with politics, and how I now have the choice, opportunity, and drive to become more politically engaged.

My dad is one of seven children, my mom is one of six, and they both both grew up in the Texas/Mexico border's very impoverished conditions. My mom has some Jr. college education, and my dad became very well educated by a mix of luck, miracle of scholarship, and natural talent, to earn a masters from MIT. Although he gained so much from his education and the cultural experience of being 2,000+ miles from home, he constantly tells my brothers and I about his struggles as a dark-skinned Latino with limited English in still racially-divided 1970’s Boston/Cambridge. To somehow appease some of his racial-ethnic minority anxiety, he founded a group called “La Union Chicana Por Aztlán” (LUCHA), which still exists today, with the few other Mexican-Americans at MIT ( check it out. Fun fact - He drew the Aztec with the Eagle headgear depicted on the homepage more than 30 years ago: http://web.mit.edu/lucha/www/ ). He tells me that was his “small stint” in the Chicano political movement; for the rest of his college career, he felt he needed to do well academically to get a well-paying job because he had nothing to go home to. He speaks that if he had gone to school where there were Latinos, say, in Texas or California, he could have envisioned himself being extremely politically engaged in Chicano Movement, to the point of probably flunking out to follow such ambitions. Instead, he opted for what he called an “internal” political statement by succeeding for my family’s social advancement and breaking negative US-Latino stereotypes.

Today, my father speaks of how his entire life he felt he had to generally stay politically uninvolved because he “has a family” that will always come first (a very prominent value within the Mexican culture).  His feeling of having to sacrifice political involvement manifests in anything from our formal notion of electoral politics such as campaigning and voting to the politics at his work environment. He’s had the same job for nearly 30 years and, while he speaks of its grave structural flaws and injustices, how he feels his intellectual potential isn’t nearly as tapped into as it could be, he doesn’t want to raise his voice to make change because he has “two kids in college and one going in.” He can’t risk losing his job by demanding change from his bosses because this would be “selfish.” This speaks to Ophelia and Junsuks’ Korean experience where the traditional focus lies first on the family before anything else.

Due to my father’s trepidation toward formal political engagement, I was similarly not very involved until I came to Amherst. There was some talk in high school with my liberal, hippie-Austin friends and their parents, but it was remained a phenomenon very removed from me because my priorities were doing well in school, doing well by my parents’ standards so I could advance my Mexican-American family and people. I felt like I didn’t have time to educate myself on political issues between my academics, extracurriculars, and family commitments, and no one in my family was speaking of it much.

My interactions in class and among my Amherst peers have changed my attitude toward politics forever. I now have a sense of political agency and responsibility that I can confidently say is one of the greatest gifts with which I will graduate. If it wasn’t my exposure to much more political and dynamic friends and acquaintances from different backgrounds, be it through their Facebook posts and statuses, hearing about their summer internships with the Obama Campaign, sharing breakfast at Val in the morning as we read the political headlines in the New York Times, or following their political online blogs, I would not have my current political involvement and aspirations.    

While my political education still leaves much to be desired, I now have a great zest to become more involved in politics, in law, and directly in its larger social sphere impact. I spoke in an earlier post how I shifted from a great desire to serve individuals as a clinical psychologist to a desire to serve people at a larger scale. In the last year, I realized how much policy and politics affected this larger change I want to make, specifically within minority women’s education. I cannot report a clear and certain path of where this will take me at this moment, but I do have these certain fantasies of being some sort of political voice for Latina women since there are so few of us educated to the degree that I have been so fortunate to obtain. I find this sense of political motivation to bring justice to the socially disenfranchised as a legacy of my father’s political involvement. Even if his involvement was less rooted in the common rhetoric, it was his actions, motivations, stories, and the emotional links between them to advance my family and my people that has put my political attitudes where they are today. I am humbled and grateful for this. I hope others can similarly realize how emotions and stories hold just as much power in politics ( if not more) as the most formal education of it.

My perspective on electoral politics has been greatly influenced by my mom, who has never taken much of an interest in politics and has the mentality that with hard work and diligence, people can accomplish anything despite what kind of government exists. Cynicism about electoral politics has traditionally run through my family, and a bit of this cynicism also runs through me. It seems that most politicians are too afraid to make radical changes because they are in the race for re-election.

Another issue I’ve struggled with is the separation of church and state in electoral politics. I don’t think it’s possible to completely separate the two. If someone strongly believes in the Bible, how can he separate his life into two distinct sectors, not taking mind of the other sector when making decisions.

This leads me to another point about the motives of the elected. If people running for positions of power are really interested in making changes that they believe matter, they would stand up for their beliefs rather than trying to sugar-coat or cater to the beliefs of those they want votes from. Thinking about the motives of people running for positions of power is important because this really determines what direction these people will take on the different issues they claim to care about once they are elected.

This unit reminded me of a simple example of electoral politics: my high school’s Student Council. The two candidates running for president both had interesting ideas about how to change our school for the better, but when thinking about who to vote for, most of the student body took into account how each candidate had interacted with the student body as a whole before the elections began and during the elections. As part of the student body, I wanted to vote for someone who would be willing and open to listening to my ideas and have a grasp on how to go about making changes. I also considered it very important for the elected to be someone who could represent the student body, not only considering what he found important, but also what other students found important.