Once Upon a Time When I Was Young

[seraphcelene]

viciouswishes set me the following prompt:

What is something specific that you want to happen in the next 50 years? Something that will mean something to you, so not just say world peace.

To which I replied ...

Oh, oh .... This is a good question and a hard one to answer. Do I take the optimistic view and say something idealistic like "I hope that racism is no longer such a big issue" because racism means a lot to me. A day doesn't go by that I don't think about what it means for me to be who I am in terms of racial and cultural identities. Although, in a way, that is perhaps an odd response for me because I am SO not engaged in the Race Debate of Doom currently making such a frou-frou-ra in fandom. In fact, I intentionally disengaged because at a point it became SO NOT fun and SO VERY disheartening that I had to take a step back. Although, I think it's a vitally important discussion to have, fandom is also a place of creativity and relaxation for me and when it becomes work and not fun, I don't want to do it anymore.

I've also seen a trend towards over analyzing and hyper sensitivity towards depictions of race and color that I find problematic and preemptive. The recent comments concerning the nameless Chola on SCC, for example. Someone was in arms about the fact that she had no lines and was referenced in the credits as Chola. Well, that's what I thought of her as soon as I saw her and until such time as she is introduced she will remain, in my mind, Chola Homegirl. Right now, at this point in the story, I don't think she warrants a name. Many characters in text and other media don't warrant a name more descriptive than Second Tall Man and being a CoC doesn't change that. Chola Homegirls is mostly a plot device right now and like the nameless Homeboys inside the house, but with so much more charm and personality, I don't think she's a Bob and I desperately hope that she doesn't become one, but it's still too early in the game to tell. Now, if we get anymore moments with her on screen and she isn't named, well, I'll revisit the issue.

But that's all still related to fandom. In the Real World, I DO NOT play when it comes to racial stereotypes, although I still feel the same way. Race is a weapon used to empower by both groups on both sides of an issue. Fears of being politically incorrect or racially insensitive can be used by PoC like a sort of Sword of Damocles. It's a double-edged issue, requiring as much patience, tact and open mindedness as vehemence and conviction.



I could also hope that there is a cessation or easing of gender stereotypes for both men and women. Although I am more invested in the correction of female stereotypes, it would also be a good thing if we learned to embrace more liberal terms of identification in male behaviors. Emo and the Metrosexual are movements in that direction, but still with some negative connotations. Women, well, I will be excessively happy on the day when women learn the value of themselves without it relying upon or being intrinsically tied to their success in the domestic sphere. A woman is still expected to want a family and marriage and two point five kids and if she doesn't there's something wrong with her. Her body is still not her own, inscribed by the media and determined by the masculine gaze, it is still an object to be lusted after and bartered for. We remain exquisitely critical of the female body. More now than ever before, we altar it to fit limited, unrealistic ideals of pre-determined beauty. We buy into the idea that this is what we want, too: a bigger bottom, bigger breasts, a smaller waist, fewer lines in our face. But when we look at attraction from a woman's perspective we see a different appreciation for the maturing male body. And as ever, women are still sluts and boys continue to be boys.

These issues are personal and important to me not just because I am a woman, but also because I continue to be asked, by the same aunts who have known me my entire life, when I will get married and have children. They seem to measure my level of success, in part, upon my willingness to sacrifice my body on the altar of fecundity and traditional models of womanhood. It's as if the bachelor's degree, the master's degree, the management experience, the world travel don't quite mean as much as I thought they did. It doesn't always seem to count that I have aspirations of obtaining a PhD, teaching at a University and having a fabulous library in a little three bedroom cottage.

There are still a great deal too many people who insist, "You've got to have children. Who's going to take care of you when you get old?" As if having children guarantees that I will not be alone in my old age, abandoned or shoved aside because my infirmities are inconvenient in a world geared towards the young and beautiful. The only thing children guarantee me are gray hair and stretch marks.

But these are expansive, idealistic themes and I am a realist at heart. What that means is that I do not believe that in the next fifty years our tolerance for those who exist outside of the margins will be all that much greater than it is now. I think that things will improve, without a doubt we're experiencing the birth pains (the legalization of gay marriage, for example), but for every two steps forward there is a step back (the perpetual, ever looming threat of reversing Roe v. Wade, among others) and that reduces the leaps and bounds of progress to baby steps.

In fifty years I will be 81 and, if family history remains true, I will be staring death squarely in the face (with one grandparent remaining, the other three bit the bullet between 82 and 83). When I look back at the preceding fifty years, I'd like to see that I changed. I'd like to be able to recognize my growth as a person, both professionally and personally. I'd like to see that I fell in love, at least once, hard and with abandon. I'd like to see that I overcame my fears of failure, and thus my fears of success. It would be enchanting to know that I'd left a book behind, something published for real with my name on the cover (a surer path to immortality than having children whose children's children may or may not even know who you are, but the Library of Congress, ahh!!! They will always remember). Ideally, I will have a couple of passports full of stamps and boxes of photos documenting the width of the life that I have lived as well as the length.

There's still that pesky idealism in me that hopes for the changes I mentioned above: the end to intolerance, universal health care in the U.S. because I know what it's like to be poor and have no medical insurance. I've watched my BFF struggle with bills from an accident (she was hit by a drunk driver) in which she was the victim. There's that hope that flexible schedules will become the norm and that women are no longer penalized for wanting to have a career and a family. I'd like to see the Hydrogen Fuel Cell come to realization and be an economic and environmentally viable option. I'd really, really, really love to see the healthcare become something that encourages preventative medicine and not just a money making operation where corporations compete to see who can sell the most pills to a consumer base. I'd die to see the end of commercials offering effortless weight loss in a bottle and the banning of commercials encouraging fiscal irresponsibility in pursuit of unnecessary credit spending and plastic surgery.

So, yeah. There you have it. I've kinda rambled around the topic at hand, as usual. I'm not sure that I exactly answered the question, but then again, when do I ever really.



Mucho thank you's to viciouswishes for the prompt. I'm liking this meme. Yes, yes I am.

Tomorrow's prompt is courtesy of glossing and then moireach after that.

ETA: If you want to get in on the action and suggest a topic, the original post is here.

Comments

[seraphcelene]

Thanks so much for suggesting the topic. It was a lot of fun to write!!!!