Jenny Brown wrote:
> She was defending the SCHIP program against Bush's veto but the
> appeal was entirely for "the
>children," playing on the idea of children being innocent, deserving
>etc. blah blah.
>Why did she not throw in somewhere that this SCHIP things is a horrible
>half-measure and what we really need is national health care?
Mandatory public-momism. That's what this is called in "Avoiding Politics" a book by Nina Eliasoph that came out a few years ago. Bitch probably knows this one. I think I heard about it from her to begin with.
>To test her theories, Eliasoph participated in three different types of
>groups in the atomized suburbs of the San Francisco Bay area: Political
>activists, "volunteers," and a country-western dance club.
>In her book, she shows how activists avoid analytical, idealistic, political
>talk in public settings * even in their own meetings.
>The political group Eliasoph studied opposed construction of a toxic waste
>incinerator, and came to be knowledgeable about the military's role in
>toxics production, the place of profit in incinerator construction, and the
>stonewalling of government officials. And yet they were always afraid that
>such discussion in their meetings * as opposed to during a poster-making
>session or over breakfast * was "going off on a tangent." They would even
>apologize for bringing up such topics.
>When it came to speaking at a rally or to the press, their statements of
>concern focused on property values, amorphous fear, or what Eliasoph calls
>"mandatory public Momism."
>The discourse would often shift the very moment reporters turned on their
>cameras, and shift back again the moment cameras went off. One older woman,
>an activist since the civil rights movement, always dumbed down her response
>to reporters: "She's a new mom and I'm an old mom. That's why we're in it.
>We're worried."
http://www.metrotimes.com/19/42/Reviews/culWho.html