Dismantling the bootstrap myth
What Martin Luther King Jr. had to say about farmers
I always felt frustrated by the word “bootstrap.” No one, no matter how resourceful, inventive or hardworking ever fully goes it alone. But somehow I had failed to recognize how triggering and deeply damaging this philosophy is to my community.
I am a black woman, and I’ve spent my entire career as a farmer advocate, working alongside immigrant farmers and promoting policies that make it easier for young people to start farms. Last spring, a new awareness came crashing down for me when my coworker forwarded me this email from one of the members of the advocacy organization that I work for, the National Young Farmers Coalition: “As a multi-minority, the title ‘Bootstrap Blogger’ is entirely problematic. You should really try again. […] The narrative insinuated isn’t inclusive or appropriate in the type of work that we do. All in all, do better. Thanks” Whoa. I had missed something big.
To back up, the National Young Farmers Coalition hosted a popular series called the Bootstrap Blog that highlighted the personal stories of farmers just starting out. The bootstrap idea often gets used in the farm community to celebrate the extreme resourcefulness and dogged persistence that it takes for young farmers to make it today. Our blog had been named to recognize the hardscrabble life that farmers face and for its clever ring and nod to the close relationship that most farmers have with their boots.
After receiving that email, my coworkers and I did a little research, and we didn’t have to dig very far to see what was really wrong with “bootstrap.”
Although it has become synonymous with the American Dream, the word bootstrap is loaded with negative meanings for people of color and black people in particular. The concept has been used to place blame on people of color for our own oppression — the idea that anyone can improve their socioeconomic situation through hard work and determination alone trivializes race and discounts the barriers to success that structural racism creates for us. The legacies of slavery, violence, unequal education, dispossession of land and property, mass incarceration, and discriminatory lending practices ensure that we are not all starting on a level playing field.
Simply put, we live in a nation in which some are issued boots and some are not.
Even Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. himself addressed the word bootstrap as it applies to farmers. In a sermon in 1968, he pointed out that “over-reliance on the bootstrap philosophy” empowers us to view a lack of economic mobility in the black community as a result of individual failure, rather than as a deeply and intentionally rooted systemic social problem. His words:
In 1863 the Negro was told that he was free as a result of the Emancipation Proclamation being signed by Abraham Lincoln. But he was not given any land to make that freedom meaningful…It simply said, “You’re free,” and it left him there penniless, illiterate, not knowing what to do. And the irony of it all is that at the same time the nation failed to do anything for the black man, through an act of Congress was giving away millions of acres of land in the West and the Midwest. Which meant that it was willing to undergird its white peasants from Europe with an economic floor.
But not only did it give the land, it built land-grant colleges to teach them how to farm. Not only that, it provided county agents to further their expertise in farming; not only that, as the years unfolded it provided low interest rates so that they could mechanize their farms. […] It’s all right to tell a man to lift himself by his own bootstraps, but it is a cruel jest to say to a bootless man that he ought to lift himself by his own bootstraps.
As Dr. King plainly points out, the American Dream — the idea that someone can bootstrap their way to prosperity — is dependent on a set of advantages that aren’t equally available to everyone. All young farmers face significant barriers, but it is important to understand that farmers of color face barriers both historic and ongoing that make it even more difficult for them to succeed.
The discrimination against black farmers that Dr. King refers to persisted well beyond emancipation, beyond Reconstruction, and well beyond Dr. King’s lifetime. The USDA paid billions of dollars to settle the Pigford, Garcia and Keepseagle lawsuits that determined tens of thousands of black, Hispanic, and tribal farmers were denied access to basic government farm programs, such as operating loans and technical assistance. Dr. John Boyd Jr., founder of the National Black Farmers Association recounts his appalling treatment by a white USDA loan officer who tossed his application in the trash, spat on him, and even slept during the loan-application interview process.
Even though it is important to understand, acknowledge, and remember these injustices, we can’t dwell here. The most pervasive and destructive type of racism is not what happens between individuals like Dr. Boyd and his loan officer, but the structural racism that is imbedded in our institutions, public policies, and even our language.
In this moment in history it is more important than ever that we move beyond blame and guilt and work towards what Dr. King called the “beloved community” — a society founded on justice, equal opportunity, and love of one’s fellow human beings.
In this moment in history it is more important than ever that we move beyond blame and guilt and work towards what Dr. King called the “beloved community” — a society founded on justice, equal opportunity, and love of one’s fellow human beings. What bothers me about the bootstrap philosophy — beyond the false implication that we all have an equal opportunity to succeed based on our own merits — is that it celebrates an individualistic and competitive ideal of success rather than what most of us in the farm community really value: collaboration, interdependence, and mutual support. Essentially the same values that Dr. King envisioned for the beloved community.
After getting that email condemning our use of the word bootstrap, my coworkers and I could have gotten defensive or swept it under the rug, but we didn’t. We chose to face it head-on and use it as an opportunity to educate ourselves and have open and honest conversations with each other, however tricky. And this is the main challenge to all of us ahead in the ongoing struggle to eliminate racism in all of its forms.
The National Young Farmers Coalition is working towards a nation where farmers are supported by our government policies, our communities, and each other. That’s why I do this work. We are trying to build a future where it is possible for any young person who is willing to work hard, get trained and take a little risk to support themselves and their families by farming. Sadly, we are still far from this reality. Questioning “bootstrap” and other destructive myths is the first step. From here on out I am committing to writing a new narrative that respects all of our struggles and truly embodies what I believe in.
