It’s true… I’ve been in a “burn down the capitol” mood the past few weeks. My best friend has definitely helped fuel it, being the communist that he is (haha), but the fact is, I’ve somehow come full-circle in realizing where I stand on a lot of things.
When I left college (my radical, left-wing women’s college in MA), I was very tired of the constant push for activism and very much ready to hear what Georgetown had to say about change within the system, the virtues of being moderate, and, generally, the importance of de-radicalizing. My first year of graduate school, I’ll admit, I bought in, hook line and sinker, because they were telling me exactly what I wanted them to, exactly what I wanted to hear - and from Georgetown, supposedly the most reputable source in the country. A graduate degree in Government from Georgetown is a degree in Moderate Politics, whether you want it or not (I’m not talking about SFS, that’s a degree in Conservative Politics), and I ate it up because I was tired, tired of the Pioneer Valley with all the old hippies who never affected any real change in the world because they never left their happy little bubble, tired of people always yelling about change but never doing anything - I got this great experience where I could work towards what people I respected (my professors) called change, and not scream and yell and run myself out because of it.
And I applied for the government jobs. And the think tank jobs. And the internships. I courted the Federal Government for employment multiple times before getting cold feet at the last minute. I visited the State Department and registered for the exam, only to not show up on the morning of the test. I got the internship, and I took it, and I show up for work dutifully every day and sit in an office where people work within the system, putting their Georgetown graduate degrees to good use getting paid by the government to tell the government what it wants to hear. And I can tell you now, after months of having “worked within the system,” that I have never been more radical in my life.
I am thankful for my Georgetown degree, because I have also never been more well-educated in my life about the issues I want to act on. And I’m going to law school for people like this, and all the liberation lawyers who came before me, who got educated, who learned the law, and who used it not within the system but against the system. Who used their brains, their educations, their passion, to really change things. I know who I am - more now than ever - and I know where I stand, and I also know that I am backed by the best education available to anyone in this country. This should be a terrifying thing to anyone who clings to the structures of oppression.
I regret that I wasn’t alive then; I regret bitterly that I wasn’t there to fight police outside of Stonewall, to stand up for women’s rights in the 60’s and 70’s, to fight segregation, to take the first steps towards liberation. But those were just the first steps, just the first steps, in a long journey - and I am becoming a powerful force: educated, passionate, confident, and driven - to keep taking the steps we have to take to follow in the paths of the people who were there to do those things, to pave the way so that someone like me can get a degree from Georgetown, a law degree, a career, and make real change.
In the past I’ve been afraid, afraid of myself, afraid of what other people would think, afraid of making my way in the world. I’ve apologized for who I am, and that’s something I will never forgive myself for. I have learned, in the past few years, that I am an incredible young woman. I am a radical feminist, a gay, Jewish, Hungarian-American Woman; I will soon be a lawyer, I am Georgetown-educated, I am a political scientist, I am one hell of an intellectual, I am powerful and intense and not shy or demure or afraid, I am not apologetic, I am not pushed around. And one day soon, I am going to raise holy terror to the pieces of this broken system that tried and continue to try to break and silence people like me, and people not like me, and people like you…
So yes, I’m going to law school. But I guess what I’m saying is, don’t expect to see me in a corporate suit anytime soon.
