Follow-Up: Responding to Rachel's Post 11/4/10

In "The Lady and the Tramp", Gwendolyn Mink brought up some very important issues in relation to welfare and single women. Her article revolved around the politics of this topic, and how single women with children are stereotyped as being "lazy, promiscuous, and matriarchal", leading to a lack of support from Congress. In reading this article, I found that I could identify with Mink when she described how it was hard for her to relate to poor women stuck in a situation where they require welfare. Although I do acknowledge that this is a serious issue, and an unfair circumstance for most of these women to be in, I would find it very difficult to spend my time fighting for this cause because as far as I can tell, it does not directly affect my life. I know that sounds very selfish to say, but I believe that most white, middle-class women feel the same way due to the fact that the conflict of welfare is not relevant to their lives. It is like the concept of "womanism", created by black women, where they felt like they were not recognized. In this situation though, it is more representative of economic discrimination.