Why Don't They Pay Attention?

I didn’t know what I didn’t know. I have lived through a lot of world events and often I was completely oblivious to the events. I didn’t pay any attention to the news, politicians, or world events around me in my twenties. Why?

I was too busy trying to make it to look up.

I didn’t watch many news programs and I didn’t take any newspapers except the local “Ozark Spectator.” I usually opened the Spectator and went straight to the pages on births, deaths, engagements, and marriages. I also read the columns written by the elderly ladies about who visited whom and who ate at the Western Sizzlin in celebration of an anniversary or who baked a cake for the church potluck.

I knew Betty and Jack visited their aunt Emily after church and they all had coffee and chocolate pie. They left early because Jack’s gout started acting up.

I scanned the rest of the paper for anything interesting — I loved the letters to the editor back in the day. These have been published since way before Facebook statuses and some of the letters provided the most out-of-pocket statements and accusations. It was wild to read conspiracy theories and rants against the local government for stop signs and tax rates. Even wilder were the folks who wrote to the paper to clear their name of some rumor that had taken off — feeling the need to clear their name to everyone in town.

I looked forward to the weekly paper. It came out every Wednesday at noon. It was worth the quarter.

I was working as a teacher when the housing crisis of 2008 happened. I was living in Altus, Arkansas making 33K per year. I lived in my mom’s old rent house and I was raising two boys. I had just earned my Master’s degree and I was in my third year of teaching. I was barely keeping my head above water with life and school and work.

My mom let me live in the old house rent-free. If I would have had to pay rent on top of my student loans, groceries, car payment, and utilities, I never would have made it. I was making less than $2200 per month after taxes and insurance. With an MA.

Now here’s something you may not believe…

I didn’t know the housing crisis in 2008 was that bad or that banks were bailed out or that folks lost their jobs due to both of these things. Why? It didn’t happen to anyone I knew and I read mostly local news — I doubt there was much said about it in my local paper. An occasional headline and then back to Betty and Jack and his gout.

I am positive I turned on the TV and likely heard of the crisis on the nightly news, but I didn’t know anyone with investment property. I didn’t know anyone with money tied up in the stock market. I didn’t know anyone who wasn’t struggling to pay bills before 2008. I was worried about keeping the lights on in my 1100 square foot ranch. Nothing changed in my world. I was poor before and poor after.

Somebody told us Wall Street fell, but we were so poor that we couldn't tell. ~Alabama

I think about this often when I read comments about people, often disadvantaged people, who “don’t pay attention to politics.” I get it. It’s frustrating to see folks not voting or voting against their self-interest. It can be head-scratching to see someone have next to nothing and then not even care to figure out why. It can be irritating to see poor folks take a minute to look up, blame the wrong person or the wrong organization or the wrong political party for their poverty, and then get back to work.

Didn’t they study Civics? Do they not understand how the government works? Do they not care?

Well, there is nuance to most situations and the poor folks I grew up around and the poor folks I know today did study Civics, but it was 30 years ago and they didn’t cover much on state supermajorities or the difference between a House Bill and a Senate Bill. I don’t remember talking much about codifying laws or filibusters. We didn’t spend time on down-ballot races or county or school board elections.

This is problematic, but not the main reason some poor people don’t pay much mind to politics. It’s because you have to have the time and resources and head space to really dig into a huge and disorganized mess like politics.

If you’re working a full-time job with kids who play sports and have homework and need to eat and need clean clothes and need a lunch packed, well there goes your time and resources to study politics and political races. You’re just trying to make it. There’s only so much time in the day.

I know I felt dumb when it came to voting. When I was younger, I just voted for Republicans if I voted at all. It was easier because the churches I attended pretty much told us who to vote for. That was usually a Republican.

I didn’t think much about politics until I had the time to think about politics.

I started by listening to NPR on the way to work. It seemed efficient. Short bites and stories and policies and politicians. I met another teacher in my building who taught History and who also listened to NPR — I was able to lean even more into politics. I had someone I could ask questions and talk more in depth.

We were both horrified when we went into the teachers’ lounge one day for lunch. There, taped to the table, was a printout about President Obama. Another teacher had printed a Facebook post for all to see. The post said President Obama was a Muslim and a threat to Christians. It said he was planted by the Taliban to disrupt and kill Americans. This was likely one of the most educated rooms in town and a nasty conspiracy theory was taped to the table. I could barely eat that day.

I woke up.

As I got older, and my kids moved out, I could spend more time reading the news and books on politics and history. NPR was a gateway drug to C-Span which led me to talk to folks who knew more than me. I wrote my first email to my State Representative.

And, that’s how I went from 0 to 100.

From not participating to running for office. It was a long process and that’s why I talked at doors for so long when I ran for office. It’s why I spent an hour with a man outside of his home in Albany, Missouri and why I drive all across the state to speak and why I make Tik Tok videos and write Tweets and post on Instagram. I am trying to meet people where they are because that’s what a teacher does. I don’t know if that ever goes away.

I was talking to a professional acquaintance a few weeks ago. She likely knows my politics because I ran for office, but I don’t know hers. We have never visited about politics. After nearly a decade of working together, she asked me why I am a Democrat. She said, “they’ve been in power for four years and things just keep getting worse in Missouri.”

Yes! This is the invitation I needed. I told her that everything awful and unholy in our state was coming from the Capitol. That Jefferson City defunded our schools and roads and hospitals and banned healthcare and books. She looked at me and I could see the shift in her thinking. She said, “That makes perfect sense.”

I didn’t ask her why she didn’t know the difference between state level policies and federal laws and mandates. She is a very busy person. She is smart and involved in dozens of activities. She just needed someone to explain it to her.

We can all do that. We have to meet folks where they are and give them the confidence to keep asking questions and finding their way to understanding.

We have to remember to give people grace and then give them knowledge. It’s not that they don’t care, they are likely just too busy trying to make it to look up.

~Jess