Long ago one of the chants was “Not the Church and not the State/women will decide our fate” and we marched, sang and signed until a woman’s right to abortion was legal. I’d do it again. Women’s reproductive rights is something I care passionately about.
So apparently did Michelle Obama which is why it was her theme when she appeared for the now defeated Harris in Wisconsin, a swing state the Democrats needed to carry to have a fighting chance.
And she and her party got it wrong.
You will by now have heard all this but I am revisiting it because that was the state. A handsome and intelligent woman, Michelle Obama wore too much jewellery, a deeply unbecoming hairdo and black. Black has limited application in campaigning politics. Even the most tasteful bling says “We’re different” and even allowing for how people love celebrity, she missed.
We see
the image before we hear a word. Human beings respond faster than you can imagine to non verbal information. And when the speaker said her piece, I thought she’d stop. But no. She went on and on, whether because it was on the monitor or because she thought she’d bridge the gap by sheer volume of words, I can’t imagine. To watch was hard.
I’ve done a lot of public speaking. You try to guess your presenting image into the right place but then, you “read the room.” Humans do that – not the monitor. And if you have to turn the spoken vehicle from what you thought you came to say to something else, that is part of the skill. Because in that crucial address there was no inclusion, no offer, nothing to make you feel if you had been there, that she came to speak to you.
So who cares ?
While nearer home The Archbishop of Canterbury
resigned over the concealed abuse of children under the auspices of the Church of England, the presiding national religious body by a man, over 40 years, now dead. Some may say that the damage is done, though the beatings and sexual abuse live on in the bodies and minds of his victims who have campaigned for years to have the Church acknowledge its complicity and the cover up.
40 years ago at least, a nurse whom I will call Kay came to see me with alopecia. And that’s what she wanted to talk about although her dysfunctional relationship with her parents soon became apparent. I was just about to marry my second husband, the flat we had taken on was being decorated and that’s where we suggested she stayed, so that she had time to get her breath back. Which was fine until the silhouette of a man coming down the fire escape at the back fell across her , woke her from sleep
and she rang in terror. My husband (very nearly) told me to keep her on the phone while he drove up there and in due course they returned. He told me how the shadow had reminded her of her father who had abused her from the age of four.
It took time but Kay made it. Being in touch diminished, you can’t live people’s lives for them – until she rang to tell us that her father was applying to a theological college. My husband rang, he was her first witness and he was ex Met. My police clearance was high but I was too well known at the time. We were told among other things “We must forgive him.”
If the Church retains the right to administer its own difficulties, then it must accept and understand that the only thing that would have stopped this hateful assailant was a decision. Decision though carries the impact of judgement.
Oh “judge not, lest ye be judged.”
So the State uses too many words (going on and on and on is an illness on both sides of the Atlantic). And the Church prays rather than take a position even when children are abused. Which leaves me asking – who cares ? And before we decline into anarchy, the only constructive answer is the individual. I hope.
Hope by Jo Wade
Annalog 