“A tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” This quote by Shakespeare from “Macbeth” is an accurate description of most American political speech, especially doing this 2016 political season.
However, every now and then we hear a political speech whose truth is as bright as a full moon on a dark, cloudless night. It has the profound impact of defining or redefining how we understand reality. George Washington’s farewell speech, Franklin Roosevelt’s and John Kennedy’s first inaugural addresses, Martin Luther King Jr.’s, “I Have A Dream” speech and Barak Obama’s 2004 keynote to the Democratic National Convention are a few that had this power.
On October 13 in New Hampshire, Michelle Obama delivered a speech, if not for the ages, definitely for this age. She did so much more than give a speech supporting Hillary Clinton, or provide a searing takedown of Donald Trump’s soullessness exposed in the Access Hollywood tape from 2005. With sublime eloquence, brilliant insight and profound moral authority, she summarized with crystal clarity the oppression and suppression of women in America.
“I have to tell you that I can’t stop thinking about this,” she said. “It has shaken me to my core in a way that I couldn’t have predicted. So while I’d love nothing more than to pretend like this isn’t happening, and to come out here and do my normal campaign speech, it would be dishonest and disingenuous to me to just move on to the next thing like this was all just a bad dream.”
She was able to capture and characterize the inherent misogyny in America’s paternalistic culture – the culture which all women and girls, independent of class and status, must overcome. She described a culture that marginalizes and subordinates half of its population. For the record, that indictment is true for every culture on the planet.
She also did something more profound. She created a narrative that speaks to what it means to be “the other” in America: to have your humanity compromised and your body at risk, not for what you may done, but simply because of who you are.
“To make matters worse, it now seems very clear that this isn’t an isolated incident,” she said. “It’s one of countless examples of how he has treated women his whole life. And I have to tell you that I listen to all of this and I feel it so personally, and I’m sure that many of you do too, particularly the women. The shameful comments about our bodies. The disrespect of our ambitions and intellect. The belief that you can do anything you want to a woman.”
The “he” in the aforementioned quote is referencing more than Donald Trump. If you are a black man, a Mexican immigrant, a Muslim or a member of the LBGT community, you know exactly what she’s talking about. Because what she said about the condition of women applies to everyone the culture defines as a nonwhite male.
The 2016 Presidential Election is not about Hilary Clinton’s trustworthiness or Donald Trump’s fitness to be president. The election is about whether the darkness Donald Trump represents in American culture will carry the day.
Since its founding, America has been in perpetual war with itself. On one side is the idea of America, aspirational America. This is the America represented in the person of President Obama and what he is always referring too. Then there is the reality of America represented in Donald Trump. This war will extend beyond this election, but November 8 is a battle we can’t afford to lose.
Mike Jones, who has held senior policy positions in St. Louis city and county government, serves on the St. Louis American editorial board and the State Board of Education.
