Yet Another True Story

This true story just happened last night, and I am safe in blogging about it because when I told the person involved that I don't own a TV, she upped the ante and said she avoids the blogosphere too. The setting is this: in my liberal college town, there is a liberal community radio station, and one day I heard a show on it touted as "news by and about women." My main complaint was that it was radically pro-choice, and it seemed to imply that all women are. Since I know for a fact that it just isn't so, I called the station and said they should present the side of a pro-life feminist. They said they would discuss it and get back to me, what was a good time to call? and I allowed how 7 in the evening on Monday they might find me at home.

Monday came and went with no call, which frankly did not surprise me one bit. What did surprise me is that yesterday when I got home, there was a message from them on my machine. I could tell from the tone of the message that the woman was more interested in evangelization than discussion, but I set aside my word game puzzle magazine and gamely called her back. She said she understood that I had called and been very upset about some sort of comment about Obama and NARAL. I said, "They asked me what would be a good time to call and I said 7 on Monday, but you called at 4 on Wednesday. If they couldn't convey a message that simple to you correctly, do you really trust their accuracy on any other count?"

The woman seemed slightly surprised that a pro-lifer knew multisyllabic words, but she quickly got down to brass tacks, whatever that means. I thought about telling her that she was wasting her time (I'm a Capricorn born in the year of the Iron Pig, and once I finally make my mind up, it's very hard to change it), but I let her prattle on. She was very into one-upsmanship, like when I said I'd been raised very pro-choice, she smugly informed me that she had been raised pro-life but had traveled the world and learned better. (N.B. She was about twice my age, which I think she figured would awe me, since as my elder she would obviously know more. I said how interesting, an acquaintance of mine who is also a Gen X-er and active in the pro-life cause decided to attend a NARAL meeting undercover, but she was the only woman in the room under 45 so they were all fawning all over her. "So the demographics hold," I said. "It's a generational thing." She was not pleased and told me they had a girl of 13 in their radical collective.) Every time she asked me why I was opposed to this or that, I had cold hard facts or an argument I'd heard from Mark Shea (my hero!) at my disposal, and at one point she got so frustrated, she started to say it was unfair that I had so many facts, then she caught herself and said she'd have to do some more research and get back to me.

"Is it OK if I call you again?" she wondered.
"Sure," I said. "I love to argue. I'm like that Monty Python skit."

You could just hear the frustration in her voice - how could someone well-educated and eloquent not be swayed by her reasoning and, worse yet, make sense? She said they had told her I wanted to present the pro-life side on their radio show, but they all agreed they wouldn't do it. Even as she said it, you could tell she knew how close-minded it sounded. (There's nothing I love more than getting liberals to realize they are just as close-minded as conservatives!) I said I understood, but could they at least say it was news for and about liberal women, not ALL women, but even that she refused to budge on. Nothing like courageously standing by your progressive views in a town where the politicians come in three stripes: Very Liberal Democrats, Greens, and Socialists. Then she pulled out what she must have thought was her best weapon: she started telling me some story about how, while she had been raised in a white, upper-middle-class neighborhood, in college she began volunteering at some inner city place, and I said, "Hm, maybe that explains our differing outlooks. I grew up in the 'hood, surrounded by all different colors of people."

That got her. All her street cred was instantly shot. It's one thing to brag about how you, the big-hearted rich white lady, spend your time helping the unfortunate little dark people have better lives; it's entirely different to say you have lived among them as their equal. One thing I have noticed about liberals is that, for all the good they do on social justice issues, they LOVE to congratulate themselves about all that good. Guess they've already gotten their reward! (Once a boyfriend and I went to the annual protest at the School of the Americas on a bus with a bunch of wacko leftist Catholics, and we were astounded and amused at how the whole way back they were patting themselves on the backs for all the protesting and organizing they had ever done.) (Most pro-life activists I've met are much more matter-of-fact about how many times they've been arrested, etc. except for my Archirritant, who is as far right as they come but could give any Leftie a run for their money with her constant bragging about all her civil disobedience.)

"Really?" said my erstwhile evangelizer in shock. "You grew up in the hood?"

I replied, rather disingenuously, "Oh, does that surprise you?" since of course that had been my goal. (Mission accomplished - stick THAT on a banner and hang it on a ship!) "Why does it surprise you?"

She knew I had her there. She probably was surprised that I was so well-read and highly educated when I'd grown up on Welfare, but she recovered and said people who had grown up in those kinds of circumstances were usually politically liberal. I said, that's interesting, because I saw plenty of abuse of the system (by white people) and then other people (Jamaican and Cambodian families) who worked their tails off and got the heck outta da 'hood. Wouldn't that tend to make a person believe that it's better to solve her own problems than expect the government to take care of her ad infinitum?

I'll let you know if my buddy from the community radio station calls me again, after she's done some more research so she can try more convincingly to convert me. Or maybe this time she will actually consider it a discussion of differing views....? Nah.

Famous Hat