Blue Skies
05-22-2008, 04:27 PM
I received this message forwarded to my inbox today - the author is anonymous but the message is universal. At the bottom, I've included a link for info about the film "Iron Jawed Angels" - I haven't seen the film, have any of you?
===============
WHY WOMEN SHOULD VOTE
This is the story of our Grandmothers and Great-grandmothers, as they lived
only 90 years ago. It was not until 1920 that women were granted the right
to go to the polls and vote.
The women were innocent and defenseless. And by the end of the night, they
were barely alive. Forty prison guards wielding clubs and their warden's
blessing went on a rampage against the 33 women wrongly convicted of
"obstructing sidewalk traffic."
They beat Lucy Burn, chained her hands to the cell bars above her head and
left her hanging for the night, bleeding and gasping for air. They hurled
Dora Lewis into a dark cell, smashed her head against an iron bed and
knocked her out cold. Her cellmate, Alice Cosu, thought Lewis was dead and
suffered a heart attack. Additional affidavits describe the guards grabbing,
dragging, beating, choking, slamming, pinching, twisting and kicking the
women.
Thus unfolded the "Night of Terror" on Nov. 15, 1917, when the warden
at the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia ordered his guards to teach a lesson to the
suffragists imprisoned there because they dared to picket Woodrow Wilson's
White House for the right to vote.
For weeks, the women's only water came from an open pail. Their food--all
of it colorless slop--was infested with worms. When one of the leaders, Alice
Paul, embarked on a hunger strike, they tied her to a chair, forced a tube
down her throat and poured liquid into her until she vomited. She was
tortured like this for weeks until word was smuggled out to the press.
So, refresh my memory. Some women won't vote this year because--why,
exactly? We have carpool duties? We have to get to work? Our vote doesn't
matter? It's raining?
Last week, I went to a sparsely attended screening of HBO's new movie
"Iron Jawed Angels." It is a graphic depiction of the battle these women waged
so that I could pull the curtain at the polling booth and have my say. I am
ashamed to say I needed the reminder.
All these years later, voter registration is still my passion. But the
actual act of voting had become less personal for me, more rote. Frankly,
voting often felt more like an obligation than a privilege. Sometimes it was
inconvenient.
My friend Wendy, who is my age and studied women's history, saw the HBO
movie, too. When she stopped by my desk to talk about it, she looked angry.
She was--with herself. "One thought kept coming back to me as I watched
that movie," she said. "What would those women think of the way I use--or
don't use--my right to vote? All of us take it for granted now, not just younger
women, but those of us who did seek to learn." The right to vote, she
said, had become valuable to her "all over again."
HBO released the movie on video and DVD. I wish all history, social studies
and government teachers would include the movie in their curriculum. I want
it shown on Bunco night, too, and anywhere else women gather. I realize this
isn't our usual idea of socializing, but we are not voting in the numbers
that we should be, and I think a little shock therapy is in order.
It is jarring to watch Woodrow Wilson and his cronies try to persuade a
psychiatrist to declare Alice Paul insane so that she could be permanently
institutionalized. And it is inspiring to watch the doctor refuse. Alice
Paul was strong, he said, and brave. That didn't make her crazy.
The doctor admonished the men: "Courage in women is often mistaken for
insanity."
Please, if you are so inclined, pass this on to all the women you know.
We need to get out and vote and use this right that was fought so hard for
by these very courageous women. Whether you vote democratic, republican or
independent party - remember to vote.
History is being made.
Author Unknown
================
Wikipedia entry for "Iron Jawed Angels" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Jawed_Angels)
===============
WHY WOMEN SHOULD VOTE
This is the story of our Grandmothers and Great-grandmothers, as they lived
only 90 years ago. It was not until 1920 that women were granted the right
to go to the polls and vote.
The women were innocent and defenseless. And by the end of the night, they
were barely alive. Forty prison guards wielding clubs and their warden's
blessing went on a rampage against the 33 women wrongly convicted of
"obstructing sidewalk traffic."
They beat Lucy Burn, chained her hands to the cell bars above her head and
left her hanging for the night, bleeding and gasping for air. They hurled
Dora Lewis into a dark cell, smashed her head against an iron bed and
knocked her out cold. Her cellmate, Alice Cosu, thought Lewis was dead and
suffered a heart attack. Additional affidavits describe the guards grabbing,
dragging, beating, choking, slamming, pinching, twisting and kicking the
women.
Thus unfolded the "Night of Terror" on Nov. 15, 1917, when the warden
at the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia ordered his guards to teach a lesson to the
suffragists imprisoned there because they dared to picket Woodrow Wilson's
White House for the right to vote.
For weeks, the women's only water came from an open pail. Their food--all
of it colorless slop--was infested with worms. When one of the leaders, Alice
Paul, embarked on a hunger strike, they tied her to a chair, forced a tube
down her throat and poured liquid into her until she vomited. She was
tortured like this for weeks until word was smuggled out to the press.
So, refresh my memory. Some women won't vote this year because--why,
exactly? We have carpool duties? We have to get to work? Our vote doesn't
matter? It's raining?
Last week, I went to a sparsely attended screening of HBO's new movie
"Iron Jawed Angels." It is a graphic depiction of the battle these women waged
so that I could pull the curtain at the polling booth and have my say. I am
ashamed to say I needed the reminder.
All these years later, voter registration is still my passion. But the
actual act of voting had become less personal for me, more rote. Frankly,
voting often felt more like an obligation than a privilege. Sometimes it was
inconvenient.
My friend Wendy, who is my age and studied women's history, saw the HBO
movie, too. When she stopped by my desk to talk about it, she looked angry.
She was--with herself. "One thought kept coming back to me as I watched
that movie," she said. "What would those women think of the way I use--or
don't use--my right to vote? All of us take it for granted now, not just younger
women, but those of us who did seek to learn." The right to vote, she
said, had become valuable to her "all over again."
HBO released the movie on video and DVD. I wish all history, social studies
and government teachers would include the movie in their curriculum. I want
it shown on Bunco night, too, and anywhere else women gather. I realize this
isn't our usual idea of socializing, but we are not voting in the numbers
that we should be, and I think a little shock therapy is in order.
It is jarring to watch Woodrow Wilson and his cronies try to persuade a
psychiatrist to declare Alice Paul insane so that she could be permanently
institutionalized. And it is inspiring to watch the doctor refuse. Alice
Paul was strong, he said, and brave. That didn't make her crazy.
The doctor admonished the men: "Courage in women is often mistaken for
insanity."
Please, if you are so inclined, pass this on to all the women you know.
We need to get out and vote and use this right that was fought so hard for
by these very courageous women. Whether you vote democratic, republican or
independent party - remember to vote.
History is being made.
Author Unknown
================
Wikipedia entry for "Iron Jawed Angels" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Jawed_Angels)