Rant: Grad Students, You are Not Oppressed

I keep seeing posts online by graduate students (those working on Master’s degrees or Ph.Ds) about how much their lives suck and how oppressed they are.I sympathize with those who are grad students who are genuinely are being mistreated – such as those working as Graduate Assistants who are being asked or pressured to work extra hours without pay (which is highly unethical but far too common), and students of color who are not being granted equal opportunity as their white peers – but that’s what not what this rant is about. This rant is about graduate students who feel they are being victimized simply because they are graduate students and because OMG, being a graduate student in the hardest thing in the fucking universe.

Before anyone questions my ability to truly understand how oppressive graduate school is because maybe I haven’t been through a grad program myself or something, let me say that I do have an advanced degree in my field. I got this degree after dropping out of two other graduate programs, and I believe I only finished the degree I do have only because every day for over a year I repeated the same mantra to myself, “I just need to fucking finish.” I know graduate school isn’t easy. I’m not about to suggest that it is.

But, look. Here’s the thing. Graduate school is a privilege. Yes, I know, grad students, you’re drowning in loan debt, you’re broke, you’re buying cheap cigarettes and eating canned soup at home because you can’t afford to go out, which makes you feel like you’re part of some fringe minority group suffering while others stand idly by. But the truth is – you’re not.

You are among a minority, sure — but it is the minority of those who have been given access to the highest levels of education.  In March of 2011, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that 30% of American adults held Bachelor’s degrees , and that’s the highest number ever on record. That means that if you “only” have a four-year degree, you already have a higher education level than seven out of ten Americans. And according to this New York Times article, at least in 2011, less than 11% of Americans held graduate degrees. You will be – or already are, if you are working on a second or third advanced degree – part of this population. That’s amazing. That’s tremendous.

Especially when we consider how you got there. It probably began with you thinking that you wanted to go to grad school, and with you starting to look at programs. Shopping around, as it were. Narrowing down your choices about where to apply. Now, as I recall, though my memory may be a little rusty on this point – this kind of agency is usually not something that genuinely oppressed people have in abundance. Those who are oppressed generally do not get an array of choices. They don’t get to point to a map and say, “hmm… the entire world is open to me. Where shall I go? Decisions, decisions.” Actually, that sounds more like something a financially wealthy person would say, perhaps about where to take their yacht.  I know – not all of you are from wealthy backgrounds. As the first person in my family to graduate from any kind of college when I finished my Bachelor’s, I get that, and I’m not saying that you do.

What I’m saying, though, is that you have other resources. Because the next step in the process was that you applied, and then people selected you to go to their school. And then you were chosen. Not targeted, like a religious minority being persecuted or a victim of a hate crime being attacked, but chosen like the winner of a blue ribbon at the state fair, or, you know, someone who is hired for a position at a company. These folks looked at your application materials and thought, “yes, this person is one of the best and brightest. This person is smart. This person has potential. We want this person at our school.” While others were rejected, you were not.

Then, the most important step of all: You accepted.Now, maybe you didn’t know every single little thing that would be waiting for you on the journey ahead when you signed up.  But do we ever know about anything we agree to completely before we do it? When we get married, do we know about the fight we’ll have in fifteen years? When we buy a car, do we get to see every issue the vehicle might have in advance? All we can do is research as much as we can and then come into any situation armed with knowledge and our own best judgment. And when it comes to graduate school, we can get a lot of that knowledge beforehand. We can compare schools side by side. We can email, meet with, and talk to professors in the department. We can interview current and former students. So on and so forth. Sure, you maybe didn’t realize that you wouldn’t be able to see friends who live far away very often, or that you would have to give up your favorite hobby to make time for school. Maybe you didn’t realize that grad school requires a lot more investment than undergrad, and that other friends of yours who don’t go to grad school will have more money than you. But the potential for these things to happen – well, that information is out there, or, rather, out here – on the Internet. It’s also circulating among your friends who have already gone to grad school, and your professors at your Bachelor’s degree institution who went to grad school themselves. You’re a smart person (you got into grad school, didn’t you?), and so you must have had at least an idea of what you were getting into when you chose to enroll.

Last but not least, graduate school is not a prison. You are free to leave any time. That’s not to say that you’ll be able to find a great job with just a Bachelor’s Degree in Philosophy or Underwater Basketweaving or whatever (I certainly couldn’t, with my degree), but — you are not physically mandated to be there. Even if somehow you’ve become convinced that you’re stuck there — you are absolutely not. You still have choices, just like you did before you got there. Sure, maybe having a job making a million dollars isn’t one of them for you, and maybe that feels overwhelming. And maybe you need to pay back a lot of student loan money after you graduate and that feels overwhelming. But please, use the intelligence you (clearly) have, and while you’re multitasking between writing all those papers and/or talking about how many you have to write — please take a moment to check yourself before you start using that other “o” word.

Tara Abarara, Pop-Stealer: A Story about Privilege, Opportunity, and Dr. Pepper

So, there was this girl I went to middle school with, Tara Abarara* . We had math class together in sixth grade, but otherwise, we ran in very different circles: Tara was one of the “tough girls” who had a leather jacket at the age of 10 and got into physical fights with other girls during the passing period after math class, and my life’s ambition at the time was to be really good at school so I could go to college to become a scientist in Antarctica. Tara was also from “the Rez” – the Native American reservation; I was white and lived in town. I really didn’t pay that much attention to Tara Abarara, and Tara Abarara didn’t pay that much attention to me. She had her friends, and I had mine, and we never once spoke to each other. I probably would have gone my whole life without ever thinking about her at all. Except that one day, during lunch in sixth grade, she became Tara Abarara, Pop-Stealer – and that is not a name that is exactly easy to forget.

So, all the cool kids in middle school – even the not-so-cool kids – had money. Cash money that their parents gave them. Looking back, I think the money was maybe supposed to be for school lunches or something – but, then, a good percentage of us at that school qualified for the free or reduced lunch program – so – maybe not. Maybe their parents just handed out cash. I don’t really know. Here’s what I do know: Other kids had money, and I didn’t. And, we had a pop machine in our school cafeteria (this was back before the federal government determined these to be against the law and forced all the schools to go to juice machines), and so these other kids were doing this thing at lunch where they would saunter up to the pop machine and put in this money that they had from wherever they’d gotten it, and then they would stand around, looking all cool, drinking pop, like they were thirteen or sixteen or something. Except for me. I was eleven at the time but still drinking chocolate milk out of a little carton, like a fifth grader. So, I began a campaign with my mom to please, please give me the chance, just once, to know what it would be like to be a cool kid – to know what it would be like – to buy a can of pop from the pop machine at school. This campaign took several days, mostly because my mom wanted to know why I couldn’t just drink milk, or bring something to drink from home, if I was so thirsty.

But finally, finally, gloriously! One day, she gave in, and she handed me two shiny quarters. All morning I plotted about how I would walk up to the pop machine, and what I would buy. Then, finally, as lunch came to an end, it was time. I got in line and waited. I put my quarters into the slots and pushed in the coin slider. I pressed the button for Dr. Pepper and listened to the can fall down the chute. I reached down and took it with my thumb and forefinger. I turned around to step away from the pop machine, and there– before I even saw her coming – there was Tara Abarara, swooping up from behind me, with her fingers clutched around the top of my Dr. Pepper can, sliding it out of my hand before I even knew what was happening. “Hahahahaha!” she howled across the lunch room as she ran, disappearing down the science hall while I stumbled away, never again, that year, to get money for the pop machine – condemned to chocolate milk until at least my twelfth birthday.

The other day, Rhiannon, a friend of mine from high school, posted a status on Facebook about the weird day she was having, and I commented on it. Shortly after, I received a notification that someone else had also commented on Rhiannon’s status: someone named Tara Abarara. I was completely shocked. Tara Abarara, Pop Stealer?! Rhiannon was Facebook friends with Tara Abarara, Pop-Stealer?! I could not believe it. Mind you, we are all almost 30 now, and I didn’t even know Rhiannon in middle school. Actually, truth be told, I wasn’t even really friends with Rhiannon in high school, and I’m not even friends with her now, but she added me on Facebook a few years ago, and I remembered her name from my 11th grade history teacher taking roll, and figured, why not? And accepted her friend request. She posts some pretty insightful philosophical things that I like reading, and she likes – or, at least, “likes,” the things I post about teaching – and so, we are “friends” there. Just like, apparently, she and Tara Abarara are. Look at her, I thought, squinting at the thumbnail picture next to Tara’s comment. Look at her! That Pop Stealer! There she fucking is! God, I thought, I bet she still looks like someone who would laugh evilly while running down the science hall with your Dr. Pepper! And because these moments are exactly what Facebook was designed for, I, of course, clicked on Tara Abarara’s profile.

Before talking about what I found there, it might be a good idea to explain a little bit about what you would find on my profile if I had stolen your can of pop in sixth grade and you decided to check me out. You’d see my profile picture, of course, which is a picture I took of my own face – a white face – with no scars, no piercings. Just visible in the picture is the collar of the button-up shirt I was wearing the day I took the picture. Under my name, you’d see my degrees listed – Bachelors and Masters; no Associate’s, since I went straight into a university at 18 on a full-ride scholarship based on my grades in high school. And you’d see a list of the places I’ve lived, a list that includes cities in four states. If you clicked through my pictures, you would probably assume (correctly) that I’m single and have no children.

I have thought of Tara Abarara as a “tough girl” now for fifteen years, and when I clicked on her profile, I was not disappointed with what I found there. In a picture of her (unlike my selfie, hers was clearly taken by someone else) you can see her multiple facial piercings, including one randomly through her cheek, drawn-on eyebrows, and, you guessed it, leather jacket. Tara in 2013 looks not only like she could steal your pop before you noticed, but also like she could kick your ass before you could even turn around. But here’s what else I found out about Tara Abarara. At 28, she has five children. The father of some of her oldest boys, who looks in the photos she’s posted like he was the same age as us, died a few years ago, when he was probably only about 25. Tara Abarara, Pop Stealer, did not go to college, community or not, and instead got her education from the toughest parts of The Rez, away from the bright glow of the tribal casinos, out where meth is traded on the streets without sidewalks. I read on her Facebook wall a post her current boyfriend made that mentioned her: “THANX 2 DA WOMEN IN MY LIFE DAT DONE DID EVERYTHIN 4 FOR THIR KIDS. PLZ KEEP SETTIN UR GOOD EXAMPLE. U R AMAZIN,” followed by her name. It was only then that when I realized: Tara Abarara never had the option, in sixth grade, not to be a tough girl. Because when she would grow up to be a non-white woman in our country, who at 28 would legally be a single mom with five kids and only a high school education, Tara Abarara would have absolutely no choice except to be a very tough woman.

This may surprise you, but I actually don’t forgive people very easily. And, after checking out her stuff on Facebook, I’m not about to break down right here on my blog to totally forgive Tara Abarara for stealing my can of Dr. Pepper that day. Because seriously, there’s really no need for anyone, no matter who they are, to ever steal anyone’s can of pop fresh out of the pop machine that they paid with the quarters they spent three days trying to get from their mom — especially not when they swoop up on the person and then wash it down with an evil laugh. But – I do want to add something to that story. Because the Tara Abararas of the world are not just bullies in the halls of our middle schools. They are also the kids who know, even in the sixth grade, that they will never grow up to be scientists in Antarctica. The Tara Abararas of the world are also the kids who may not be paying much attention in math class, but who are learning something more important at eleven years old: How to fight to survive.

* = names and dialogue have been altered to protect the identities of those involved from being found on Facebook by people who they did not steal pop from in the sixth grade. Not that you’d go looking for them or anything, but, you know.

Experiences at Today’s Rally and March for Justice for Trayvon Martin

When I posted last night about the rallies today for justice for Trayvon Martin around the country, I wasn’t sure whether I would actually go to one today myself or not. I mean, writing about it on the Internet is one thing, but actually showing up to march down city streets is quite another.  And as someone raised in the suburbs, the idea of being a part of anything that might cause a stir or make waves automatically sets off this weird, reflexive panic alarm: oooo!!! weeee-oooo!!! Better to stay home! It shrieks. Better to keep your head down! Weee—ooo!!!!

In 2006, I saw a young black man from Michigan perform a spoken word poem about a march that neo-Nazis had staged in Lansing (the capitol of Michigan) earlier that year. The poem spoke directly to white college students. So many of you call yourselves anti-racist, he said. So many of you say you’re for racial equality. But, he asked, where were you that day in Lansing? Where were you when it came time to speak out in protest? The message of that poem has haunted me ever since. It’s true. It’s easy to talk a big talk — but when it comes to actually walking the walk, that reflexive panic alarm tends to win out among folks who have the privilege and ability to turn their backs. I thought of that poem this morning.  And I thought of the names of all the people in my life who would disapprove if they knew I was going, all the people who “don’t believe” racism exists, who agree with the Zimmerman verdict, or who thinks it’s best not to “make waves.” And with absolute certainty, I immediately knew whose respect I would earn by going – my own —for having the integrity to really, actually stand up for something I believe in, regardless of what those people might think. And so, I put on my shoes, and I walked out the door.

And it was the right decision.

During today’s march.

The nearest gathering to where I live was much smaller than I expected – maybe two hundred and fifty people. The crowd was a racially diverse one that included people of all ages – actually, there were even a few dogs that came! I got there an hour into the rally, but still got to hear some amazing — truly amazing — speeches, including some from a couple of ministers who brought everyone to their feet to drown their words in cheers and applause, an almost 80-year-old former Black Panther, a local high school teacher who spoke brilliantly about this case and injustice in this country, and a relative of Trayvon Martin who lives nearby. I’m not someone who cries easily, but I felt like I was about to break out some serious crying during several of these speeches.

When these were finished, we lined up on the street next to the federal building. And together we began to march.

Accompanied by some of our city’s police force – on bikes and in their cars – we marched over two miles together down the main streets of the city. These were streets I’ve been on many times – while riding in a car, or walking on the sidewalk. But this afternoon, we walked right down the middle, and there was something so incredible about that, and seeing all the traffic stopped, seeing fists of solidarity being raised out of windows as we walked by, just getting to be a part of all of it. By the end of the march, many of us (myself included) were covered in sweat and feeling tired (we live in a hilly place, so it wasn’t a flat 2+ miles), but we reached the end of our route still chanting and cheering.

Sometimes, when I’m talking to (white) friends about race, they seem to think racism ended with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, or that the concept of racism is some kind of thing made up by politicians to elicit sympathy for some ulterior motive.  And on the issue of Trayvon Martin, most people I know stay completely  silent. “I don’t know much about it,” they’ll say, and change the subject. More than anything else, what I took away from today’s rally/march was that, even though it was a small gathering, that there are still so many people who do want to talk about it, who do want to work together to build relationships and to help create change. And I left understanding that, whenever we’re ready to put on our shoes, there is a place where each of us can start, right now, to walk the walk.

the march.

Re: “Female Inmates Sterilized in California Prisons Without Approval”

A friend just posted a link to this article on Facebook.

Knowing what I know about civil rights in this country and the prison-industrial complex (which isn’t enough, as it is, but still), how can I say that I’m even remotely surprised by this news?

And maybe surprise isn’t the right word for what I feel.

Maybe it’s just sadness.

Sadness that even with evidence like this, so many of my fellow Americans choose to deny the existence of injustice in our present time — (“it’s 2013. We’re over that kind of stuff now. We have a black president – what more do you want?”) turning their backs while this kind of violence is performed with their tax dollars.

On Silence and Safety

A few days ago, a white friend asked me just what, exactly, is wrong with racism, anyways.  “I mean, somebody has to be on the bottom, in any society. If it isn’t black people, it would just be somebody else,” she said. “I don’t know why people are complaining and making such a big deal out of it.”

Now this might sound ridiculous, or even disgusting, but my entire life, I’ve been taught that when it comes to issues that don’t appear to directly concern me, rather than shutting people down or causing a fight, that, even if their opinions are different than mine, the absolute best thing I can do is to withhold my judgment, not take sides, and respect everyone’s views — that the best thing I can do is keep the peace.

And so, this is partially a thank you letter to that friend. Because what she said made me realize that my way of thinking was incorrect. The truth is: not every opinion is worth my respect. Keeping the peace is not always consistent with acting with integrity, after all. Sometimes there are moments when lines have to be drawn, when we have to stop listening, and who it concerns, directly or indirectly, becomes an irrelevant question. Sometimes there are moments where we are left wondering: What kind of person do I want to be?

*****
Every year in November, my community – the transgender community – gathers together to read the known names of every transgender and transsexual person who has been killed for being transsexual or transgender around the world since the previous November.  Out loud, we read the names and the cause of death for every single person. “Charlie (Erika) Hernandez,” we read in 2012. “Detroit; stabbed to death. Githe Goines; New Orleans; strangulation.   Soraya  – Valmir de Silva; Brazil; gagged with pieces of wood inserted into the anus, and penis burned with alcohol. Tiffany Gooden; Chicago; multiple stab wounds. Thapelo Makutle; South Africa; throat cut, partial decapitation, genitals stuffed into mouth. Brandy Martell; Oakland; gunshot. Tracey Johnson; Baltimore; gunshot. Deja Jones; Miami; gunshot. Kendall Hampton; Cincinnati; gunshot. Kyra Cordova; Philadelphia; gunshot.” And this was only a handful. Every year we read over one hundred names; sometimes, more than three hundred.

Most of my friends who are not transgender do not know about this day. They do not know that for me, it is the most sacred day of the year.  They do not know that on this day, I do not answer phone calls. I do not send chatty text messages about pets or the weather; I do not tell jokes. On this day, I am too filled with gratitude that I have been granted twelve months of being alive, listening to all the fates that could have been mine to be able to participate in the ordinary business of living. On this day, I am too filled with sorrow – a sorrow that can never be explained, a sorrow that must be felt in the marrow to be understood – sometimes, to leave my house at all.

Some people might say that all of this – these names, these descriptions – are just lies made up to fuel some liberal agenda.  This is why many people who are not transgender do not know about this day. This day – where no politicians are present, where not a dollar is made – is sacred because it is the day we speak the terrible truth out loud.

*****
Most of my friends who are not transgender would be shocked to hear that for me, this is a day that marks my mortality – shocked, probably, to think that it has anything to do with me. I don’t look transsexual; I look like any other ordinary, nerdy white graduate student. Even to my friends who knew me before I physically transitioned, they see me as being similar to themselves in fundamental ways: somebody who reads mystery novels and drinks Diet Coke; somebody who likes dogs, forgets clothes in the washer; and somebody who belongs to the protected sphere that they do, where the possibility of dying at a young age never has to cross your mind. And, for a long time, I believed that living in this protected sphere was the goal. If I could just seem “normal” enough, if I could just get along with everybody and not contest things, if I could just respect everyone’s viewpoints, then I would be safe. But now, I wonder: Is “normalcy” – is “safety” – the ability to turn one’s back and say “this is none of my business; whatever you think is fine, no matter what” – really the place where we should want to be?

My brothers and sisters do not all die at the hands of a single person with no witnesses. There have to be other people present in some of these situations, perhaps within feet of where our bodies are thrown, people so close they get splattered with our blood. In some of these cases, there have to be people across the street from the ditches where our bodies get thrown, where we might lay breathing and alive – from where we could be saved with a telephone call they could make – but a phone call that is never made. There have to be people not wanting to jeopardize their own spot in the sphere called “normal”; people not wanting to contest things, people who value their own safety above all else.

*****

Now, maybe you think a white woman asking inside her own house what the problem is with racism is not related at all to these brutal, violent deaths. Maybe you think I’m some kooky liberal just trying to push some bullshit agenda.

And maybe it is a masochist agenda to voluntarily want to face horrible truths. Maybe this is why I’ve been limiting myself to just one day a year. But tonight I wonder: Why can’t every day be sacred, echoing with honesty? What happens when we say: Actually, what you think about continuing to deny the same privileges you’re given to another group of people isn’t actually fine? What happens when we say: As someone who fundamentally believes in equality, in liberty and justice for all, that, actually, this is my business? And, tonight I wonder, when all is said and done, who do I want to be: The person who can guarantee their own individual safety by not making a scene and who stays quiet, or the person who steps out of the complicit shadows to make the call?

*****

Since the verdict was delivered in the George Zimmerman trial, I’m not the only one asking questions right now about where I stand – on justice, on truth, on power, on privilege, and on what I’m personally willing to risk. Elie Wiesel, Holocaust survivor (and author of Night), says “we must always take sides…” that “silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.” And I wonder: What is the value of a friendship, of a community, of a culture, that asks us to say nothing in response?