I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

Category: racism

  • Dimples, Butch, Buttercup, Sissy… Sissy?

    Dimples, Butch, Buttercup, Sissy… Sissy?


    Whenever someone asks me what I’m writing, I feel a fleeting twinge of guilty laziness for saying I continue to blog – no new book of essays, no great American novel, no legacy book for my granddaughters. This is me self publishing using the same platform I’ve had for thirteen years. Never reaching 2,000 followers but loving my local and international friends who faithfully hang with me. Averaging 150 hits per post in 2022, sometimes more in other years, sometimes fewer. Somewhere along the way I found a voice, but the Boomer passion for individual achievement in the realm of literature that produced six books is mixed now with the seasoned settling of comforting routines that continue to produce my cyberspace conversations. If I ever changed my mind about publishing a new collection of my flash nonfiction, I promise the following post from the archives would be included.

    Pretty, the great Treasure Hunter, occasionally brings home items that fascinate. One such find  was two versions of a board game I played as a child growing up in rural Grimes County, Texas in the mid twentieth century. Before the television set took over as our main form of entertainment, my family played all kinds of games from dominoes to gin rummy to board games Santa Claus left for me under the tree at Christmas. One of our family favorite board games was Go to the Head of the Class which was supposedly “educational” as well as fun. With school teacher parents, I played tons of “educational” games.

    fifth series copyrighted in 1949 by Milton Bradley, publisher

    The game was originally played with tokens that were cardboard images of children attached to wooden bases. Each game had 8 tokens, and their pictures were on the book that contained the questions.

    (top row, l. to r.) Sissy, Dimples, Liz and Butch

    (bottom row, l. to r.) Sonny, Buttercup, Susie and Red

    Sissy

    I can’t find the edition when publisher Milton Bradley eliminated the unsmiling player named Sissy, but I can assure you it would have been the last token picked in my family. Buttercup would have run a close second to the last.

    Take a good look at Sissy, the little boy whose two obvious distinguishing features were that he wore glasses and parted his hair down the middle like the little girl tokens.

    I remembered Jim Blanton’s essay in Southern Perspectives on the Queer Movement: Committed to Home where he talked about growing up in Gaffney, South Carolina and being called “sissy” as a child and teenager by bullies in school. Words, labels that cause pain.

    I’m sure my parents were oblivious to the subtle cultural messages being sent to me in our educational games, but for me this game was one more nail in the coffin of internalized homophobia and intentional segregation in my childhood. Never any people of color as the tokens. No one wanted to be known as a “sissy,” and how could I explain to anyone why I always picked “Butch” first?

    This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is img_20220827_150432507_hdr.jpg

    not sure where this picture of me was taken or why – 

    did I already feel different?

    Be aware of bias and labels that hurt. Be kind to each other. Be safe this weekend.

    Stay tuned.

  • from antiques to basketball via the Seminole Trail

    from antiques to basketball via the Seminole Trail


    US highway 29 a/k/a Seminole Trail in parts of Virginia – antiques galore for Pretty to explore

    Pretty and me leaving Jefferson’s Monticello

    (photo by Susan Moore-Cooke)

    Pretty in DC at Old Ebbitt Grill established in 1856

    While Pretty collects antique treasures, I collect words; I found my treasure on a WNBA Washington Mystics t-shirt when we went to watch our home girl A’ja Wilson and her Las Vegas Aces play the Mystics in DC. Our home girl scored 22 points and had 12 rebounds in a game the Aces eventually lost to the Mystics, but Pretty and I weren’t too disappointed. We were thrilled to feel the atmosphere of the big city small arena with its diverse enthusiastic fan following. I told Pretty I was transported that night in my thoughts to the first tiny Texas gymnasium in Grimes County where I watched high school girls play basketball seventy years ago – now I watched a professional women’s team “centered in the very soul of our nation.”

    From Jefferson’s home at Monticello to the Lincoln Memorial…from historic Old Ebbitt Grill to a sports arena in the Congress Heights neighborhood of DC, our four day trip last week along the Seminole Trail reminded me my country was built upon the work of those that dared to dream different.

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    Dare to dream different, and please stay tuned.

  • you’re not allowed

    you’re not allowed


    AP photo

    Rally at South Carolina State House in Columbia

    June 28, 2022

    As Yogi Berra once said, it was deja vu all over again. As I stood with my sisters on the lobby floor, I looked straight up to the massive false dome of the Capitol and heard the whispers of power floating in the galleries above me – the same whispers I heard 50 years ago when I stood in this space rallying for ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment. The ERA had passed the SC House of Representatives unanimously in 1972 but was blocked in the Senate. Sound familiar?

    I was a member of the Columbia Chapter of the National Organization for Women in the early 1970s when we sold hot dogs at the Okra Strut as one of several fundraisers to raise money to bring two lobbyists to Columbia from the national NOW office for three weeks to help us move the Senate leadership. Unfortunately, I discovered my crock pot did not cook the hot dogs fast enough for the hordes of underage customers. I did, however, successfully volunteer to house one of the women from DC in my home. She was a black lesbian named Cappy. I wanted to be her when I grew up.

    Everyone was naively optimistic at the time; the Almighty Most Powerful in charge of the Senate was an old white man who promised us if we would just be quiet and not stir up any trouble, the ERA would go forward in the Senate. The two NOW lobbyists went home to DC with that promise in hand. However, the bill remained blocked in Committee. South Carolina became one of 15 states that never ratified the Equal Rights Amendment for women.

    Fast forward 50 years to June 28, 2022. My good friend and fellow activist Francie picked me up at my home, drove us to the State House where we joined 200 other women (and a few men) to march with our pink Planned Parenthood Together We Fight for All signs to the lobby to protest the US Supreme Court ruling last week that overturned a fundamental right for women guaranteed in the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. Women’s bodies in South Carolina were now in the hands of mostly old white men who had offices in this building.

    A young white man in a lovely beige summer suit and tie ushered us into the lobby area and asked us to “move back, make room for the next group.” Since I am super short with very white hair, Francie found a place for us near the front and told me we wouldn’t be moving. Young mothers with babies in strollers and toddlers holding Our Bodies, Our Choice signs came through. Older women holding the same Pink Planned Parenthood signs we held streamed in alongside us. A wide spectrum of humanity poured into the lobby while we watched. Soon we were packed together like Uncrustables in a 10-pack box as we held our signs high to face the large media contingent opposite our positions in the small area.

    We stood chatting among ourselves when a tall older white man holding a very large black sign with the words Abortion is Murder began walking in the open area between our contingent and the media – strolling slowly back and forth in front of us. I looked for the pleasant young man in the beige suit who had asked us to move back and make room for more people. I didn’t see him, so I turned to Francie and said in my very nicest loud voice, my goodness, what is that guy doing parading back and forth in front of us with the sign? (Not exactly what I said, not exactly my nicest voice.) The young man in the beige suit appeared immediately. With the sweetest smile, he told me we’re not allowed to interact with the other protesters. Please stand back.

    Luckily Representative Gilda Cobb-Hunter (Dem Orangeburg County District 66) arrived and began to speak to us. She thanked the marchers for showing up, for making our voices heard, and promised to continue the fight for women in South Carolina to have control over our bodies. She is a black woman who was joined by two black men, but no white male representative welcomed us to the people’s house.

    Unluckily, the older white man with the big black sign resumed strolling in the supposedly off limits area which made my blood pressure rise. I told Francie we needed to leave before I got us arrested. She sensed danger and said let’s go now. Wouldn’t you know the man with the Big Sign happened to walk directly in front of us when we began to break ranks. Hey, I said, in my not so nice loud voice, you can’t just walk back and forth with your sign in our faces in a space where no one else gets to even stand with their sign. He replied in a cold even tone “you’re not allowed to talk to me.” At that moment I heard the voice from 50 years ago telling me to be quiet, to not make trouble. I was so angry I was about to hit him with my pink sign.

    Francie sprang into action running interference by sticking her pink Planned Parenthood sign in his face – that’s what tall people can do. They can rescue short ones. She proceeded to tell him he was in a danger zone, but the man with the Big Sign stood his ground. Francie then shuffled me out of the lobby right past the Jesus people who had also appeared out of thin air, who had brought the same tired signs I’d seen all my life at every march I’d made on any social justice issue. I wondered if they were thinking to themselves there’s that old white woman still going to hell, flames licking around her.

    A woman was arrested at the State House that day, but thanks to my friend Francie that woman wasn’t me. Good thing – Pretty picked me up outside on Sumter Street at exactly 1 o’clock so that we could give our five month old granddaughter Molly her bottle on time. May the voices she hears throughout her life assure her she’s allowed.

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    Congratulations to newly sworn in Associate Justice of the US Supreme Court Ketanji Brown Jackson. Her journey for full equality for women continues today – onward.

  • with sorrow we dissent

    with sorrow we dissent


    “People Vs Supreme Court (The Sonnet)

    When the Supreme Court behaves prehistoric,
    Every human must become an activist.
    When the gatekeepers of law behave barbarian,
    Every civilian must come down to the street.
    When people are stripped of their basic rights,
    By some bigoted and shortsighted gargoyles.
    We the people must take back the reins,
    And put the politicians in their rightful place.
    We need no guns and grenades, we need no ammo,
    Unarmed and unbent we stand against savagery.
    Till every woman obtains their right to choice,
    None of us will sit quiet in compliant apathy.
    Every time the cradle of justice becomes criminal,
    It falls upon us civilians to be justice incorruptible.”


    ― Abhijit Naskar, Find A Cause Outside Yourself: Sermon of Sustainability

    Supreme Court Injudicious Clarence Thomas said landmark high court rulings that established gay rights and contraception rights should be reconsidered now that the federal right to abortion has been revoked.

    Thomas wrote that those rulings “were demonstrably erroneous decisions.”

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    I’m not a judge or even an attorney, but I argue the demonstrably erroneous decisions with respect to the highest court in the nation include the appointment of Thomas in 1991 by President George H. W. Bush (that’s 31 years ago if anyone is counting) and the three most recent appointments of Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett. Gorsuch and Kavanaugh both vowed in their congressional testimony during confirmation hearings they would not vote to overturn Roe. Very nice – justices whose own word is meaningless.

  • Happy Pride! The B-E Collection

    Happy Pride! The B-E Collection


    I recently had the privilege of being interviewed by Dianne Barrett who is a co-founder of the B-E Collection. As a personal historian who identifies as lesbian I am, of course, drawn to projects that celebrate oral histories of lesbians and our lives with a special emphasis on our careers. My video is now one of many – I hope you will go to the B-E website b-ecollection.org to watch – I did tend to go on and on for about 38 minutes, but Dianne does a great job of trying to keep me on task. She used several pictures I sent so they give a lift to my rambling.

    This is the Mission Statement of the B-E Collection under “About Us” on their website.

    My spouse, Margaret Elfering, and myself, in conjunction with archives such as the June L. Mazer Lesbian Archives and the Gerth Archives and Special Collection at California State University Dominguez Hills, will contribute an ongoing series of interviews of lesbians and their careers.  The collection will be known as the B-E Collection: Lesbians and Their Careers.

    The “B-E” of the collection is a shorthand for our last names (Barrett – Elfering).  However, there is a second meaning to our collection’s name:   the verb “be” is also defined as “to exist” or “to occur or take place”.  Our collection is a means of bearing witness to the stories of lesbians of different generations, from different walks of life.

    The mission of this collection is to dignify the accomplishments, pride, and effort lesbians put forth in their careers on their journey in life.  We make oral histories to document our existence then and now.  Many of us had the “don’t talk – say nothing – you are wrong” experience.  Now we are talking.

    We would appreciate a referral of lesbians who might be interested in participating in our project.  We would be more than delighted to speak with anyone who you think would be interested in participating in the B-E Collection.

    Your support is always a gift.

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    What a wonderful way to celebrate Pride! Thanks to Dianne and Margaret for their vision, to the creative support staff for their expertise and to the Mazer and Gerth Archives at California State University Dominguez Hills who are supporting this collection.

    Onward.

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