Michelle Obama hopes 2020 is a wake-up call, declares history is made by those who 'show up for the fight'
Michelle Obama is hopeful that 2020 has served as an important wake-up call for American citizens to make their voices heard in their communities.
Speaking to Shonda Rhimes in an interview with Harper's Bazaar, the former first lady touched on the importance of voting and standing up for progress. “With everything that’s gone on over these past few months, I know a lot of folks out there have been confused, or scared, or angry, or just plain overwhelmed. And I’ve got to be honest, I count myself among them,” Obama said, reiterating points from a recent commencement speech she gave for the graduating class of 2020.
“Our foundation has been shaken—not just by a pandemic that stole more than 100,000 of our loved ones and sent tens of millions into unemployment, but also by the rumbling of the age-old fault lines of race, class and power that our country was built on,” she added.
“The heartache and frustration that boiled over after the losses of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and so many others has caused a lot of us to grapple with the very essence of who we are—the kind of people we want to be. But even in that, I find hope,” Obama continued.
Obama pointed to one example of people coming together to make a lasting change – the passage of the 19th Amendment, which saw women earn the right to vote.
“I am thinking about how the story of progress in this country is written by the people who believe what should happen actually can happen,” she told Rhimes. “One hundred years ago, there were plenty of naysayers who thought granting women the right to vote would lead to societal decline. And there were plenty of others who were sympathetic to the cause but dismissed it with an ‘Oh, well, that will never happen.’"
“But history is made by the people who show up for the fight, even when they know they might not be fully recognized for their contributions,” Obama said. The former first lady noted that it was essential to remember activists of color who may “not have been fully” welcomed by the majority of the suffrage movement, like Sojourner Truth and Frances Ellen Watkins Harper.
“They kept on working anyway. They weren’t thinking about themselves; they were thinking about their daughters and their granddaughters," she added.
Obama also threw a not-so-subtle jab at Trump, saying one of the many results of the Covid-19 pandemic was that many Americans had opened their eyes to the importance of having “competent leaders in office — leaders who prioritize their citizens’ well-being over their own poll numbers.”
“Voting is so much bigger than one election, one party, or one candidate. It’s great to feel inspired by candidates and the visions they put forth, but it is by no means a prerequisite to casting a ballot,” she stressed. “Because at the end of the day, someone is going to be making decisions about how much money your schools get and how tax money is distributed. Voting gives you a say in those matters.”