Why I Write on Politics and Social Justice
It’s personal
Last May, a middle-aged guy was standing just in front of me in a line at an ATM, Walmart Money Card in hand. He was wearing a grimy sweatshirt with “Walmart” on the front and “Great Value” on the back. On the wall behind the ATM, someone had put up a sign: “Have You Voted?”
He stared at the sign. Then, “Vote!” Then, “Vote!” again, sneering, he turned toward me as though I were the teacher up at the front of the classroom shaking a finger at him. “Fuck! I don’t vote.”
I stepped back from the spittle and prepared a teacherly rejoinder. Don’t you care that you’re making … what? … probably the Oregon minimum $13.70 an hour while the Walton family (I should have told him the Waltons own Walmart) make $4 million an hour? Don’t you think you deserve more than $13.70 an hour?
By then, he was waving his card around wildly and was sneering and scowling. I thought he might get dangerous if I said anything. So, I kept my mouth shut.
And so, I write on politics and social justice.
After that encounter, I went to the Fred Meyer pharmacy. Standing in that line — which seems to get longer every time I go there, what with layoffs so the CEO and top management can make even more money — I heard talk about how Trump was going to really…
