The Super Bowl, the 2020 Election and the ‘Power Mom’
So, I turned 40 a few months ago (big shout out to the CTC founders for coming to help me celebrate!). I am accomplished in my career, parent two daughters with my partner, and try every day to give less and less fucks about what others think of me while empowering other women to do the same. This is not easy, as we all know, but the older I get, the more secure I am in what I have to offer to my little world and the larger world. I am a woman on path of empowerment trying to help others along. There is power in age; power in choice; power in taking control. This power, though, is exponentially harder to cultivate and harness for women than men. So, then, how do you think it made old PolySue feel when she read this week that moms are finally not invisible? Well, I felt all types of ways.
Let me take a step back. Like many CTC readers, I watched the Super Bowl halftime show and was excited to see two women of color of a certain age (barf) kick total ass. And, well, they did. While there has been backlash that the show was unapologetically Latino, too sexual, and all around unamerican, much of the coverage included the following: “Shakira, 43, and Jennifer Lopez, 50.” There was a point to be made that two old bitties carried one of the most important events in American popular culture. And to boot, coverage emphasized that they are mothers. I suppose it is because for so long women could not run, jump, dance, go to college or have jobs because their uterus would either fall out or cease to function. This week, though, an article in the Washington Post boisterously proclaimed, “It’s our time, moms.”
In the article, Dvorak writes about all the moms out there getting it done – those who can “make a casserole and balance the federal budget.” With six women running for president at its height (RIP Kirsten, Kamala, and Marianne), 2020 was dubbed the year of the woman. The conception that women were so empowered and the Democratic Party was so ready for a woman nominee was widespread (and short sighted). With more moms of young children serving in Congress than ever before, and Nancy Pelosi’s overall badass-ery, moms are “in.” Dvoark writes, “This isn’t the election year of the soccer mom (1992), security mom (2004) or hockey mom (2012). This is the year of the power mom. And power moms refuse to be invisible anymore.” So, here’s what about all this…
Women have always been treated as a commodity – our bodies, our unpaid labor, our votes. We carry it all, make the trains run on time, and in the case of black women, hold the Democratic party’s hopes on their unappreciated shoulders. So, when Dvorak talks about the soccer mom, security mom, and hockey mom vote, she isn’t wrong because those votes were heavily “courted” by both parties. Commodity. Dvorak continues, “Those superstar moms sparkled and gyrated like any 20-year-old could.” Commodity. Value is in what we can provide to others. Votes and bodies, in these cases. But I am not convinced by Dvorak’s argument, nor any other argument, that women get to decide to not be a commodity, to not be invisible. That now, in 2020, because of our Misogynist-in-Chief, presidential candidates bringing casseroles to campaign events, and two old moms leading the halftime show, women are just now reclaiming their time (all hail, Maxine Waters). It suggests we had a choice in our invisibility, and similarly, can change the white, patriarchal capitalist systems that commoditize us and make us invisible.
Here’s what, though. I’m not saying age and motherhood penalties aren’t easing for women. But saying it’s because being a mom makes women more qualified to serve in office (even though it does), and playing up those qualities is a choice by moms to not be invisible, doesn’t tell the whole story. Amy Klobuchar stating she can be a senator and run for president because as a mom she can do two things at once, isn’t her deciding not to be invisible because a mom’s invisibility is not by choice. But at the end of the day maybe, just maybe, these “power moms” have just stopped giving a fuck.
Author: Suzanne Chod