"How Many Different Fathers?": On the Intersection of Classism, Racism, Polyphobia, and Sexism

At my agency, families are supposed to be our clients. However, since children are not expected to change their behavior (so long as they are under 16, I believe), the onus of responsibility in ensuring that a case closes generally falls on the mother. Almost always the mother. Regardless of whether the case opened because the father's neglect of the children, and even sometimes regardless of whether it opened because of his abuse of them. Which is a whole other enraging post.

I have yet to have a case where a single father is raising children with the mother out of the picture, whereas the majority of my cases are ones where a woman is raising her children on her own, sometimes due to death of the father, more often due to the relationship ending and the woman "naturally" being given responsibility to raise the children. I often have cases where the father, who is still with the mother, doesn't live with the children, and as such his participation is seemingly only "encouraged" rather than "required" by the Department.

But, I wasn't intending to talk about my feelings about the Department's sexism. Or at least not about that particular iteration of its sexism. Instead I wanted to talk about the judgement that my clients receive about how many different fathers of how many different children they have.

It is, frankly, infuriating that social workers give a rat's ass about some other social worker's client's number of current or former partners. It's bad enough when I have to hear about some other worker's client who *OH NOES!* has 3 children from three different relationships, but to have people begging to know the details of my clients' sexual relationships? IN. FUR. IATE. ING. As it is when I'm complaining about a case to someone other than a coworker, and totally unrelated to what I'm saying, they need to know how many kids/fathers there are in the picture.

The thing is, I seriously don't give a shit how many partners someone has had, other than to get important information about familial relations between siblings and their parents. It is very relevant to me when I find out that one child's father is in jail, but the other child's father lives nearby and comes over once a month. It is relevant to me when I hear that a father of one of the children says that he "wouldn't mind" taking the other children if custody is taken away from the mother. These things matter to me because they say something potentially about how each child feels cared for in their family. They don't matter to me so that I can judge the mother better.

You know what literally never crosses my mind when talking to a mother who has had multiple sexual partners, and children with more than one?

That she doesn't respect herself.
That she is promiscuous and therefore less moral.
That she is out of control.
That she is stupid.

I had trouble writing that list because a) since I don't think those things automatically, it's hard to dredge them up when I try to, b) I fucking hate that these are considered appropriate things to think about someone else's choices to have children or not (or more likely, sex or not, because lots of people would just as harshly judge a woman who has had 3 abortions due to multiple sexual relationships as they would a woman with three children from multiple partners).

But I can see these thoughts scurrying across the faces and hear them embedded in the tones of those who ask me salaciously for my clients' relational details. And you know what? My clients all know that people judge them for these things. I know they know because on the few occasions where I've been able to convince (through my tone, body language, and probably some verbal cues) a client that I am not judging them for their sexual choices (or their father's or mother's sexual choices), they have invariably opened up to me emotionally and physically (less guarded posture, giving me details of their family lives, etc.) more than they had before, and more than they have with other workers.

So, this happens. Where does it come from? Perhaps you've noticed that I titled this post "On the Intersection of Classism, Racism, Polyphobia, and Sexism".

Most of my clients are poor (ok, all of my clients are poor).
Most of my clients are people of color (I was going to get my first white family this week, but another case came back so I still have a history of only families of color).

In our culture, poverty and non-whiteness are treated as though they are synonymous. This isn't the case, but you'll notice that my clients are all poor and they have all been people of color, so they *are* linked.
In some ways, I think the judgement is mostly a facet of classism, because there is an assumption that more wealthy people's relationships have been deliberated on (regardless of how long they lasted prior to marriage or children), whereas there is an assumption (and I can't say whether it's based in fact at all) that poor people are less likely to be married when they have children (I could see this being based in fact because it costs money to marry, and costs even more to divorce), which codes as "less likely to have thought about the relationship, prior to having children" (regardless of whether they've been together for 10 years) according to our society.
However, at the same time, since whiteness = money in our culture, a white family is not assumed to be poor as readily as family of color is. So, when we talk about "poor people" having lots of children "recklessly," as a society we are to be more honest as to our underlying thought processes, talking about "people of color" having lots of children "recklessly." As such, a random family of color* will be more likely to be assumed to have been the product of multiple relationships, as compared to a random white family. Related to this is the fact that since the majority of clients at my office are families of color, a "default" family that is being talked about, unless specified as white, will be assumed to be black (or maybe latino, depending on the social worker's experiences), and as such questions about sexual histories will be mapped onto a "default" family of color.

So that takes care of the classism and racism aspects of what I see going on when people ask "how many fathers?" (incredulously or certain of the answer, take your pick).

What about the sexism and polyphobia?

Well, as mentioned above, the vast majority of childraising parents are women. So, while fathers do get judged for having multiple children, just as often, I hear the mothers being judged for being in a relationship with a man with other children. Additionally, fathers often visit their children at their children's mothers' houses. As such, they have an ability to deny certain children if they wish, and social workers have an ability to neglect to wonder about other children, since there aren't any children in front of them requiring explanations. It's like a magic trick: "No children to see here!" And of course, in those instances where a woman has had multiple children with multiple partners, I NEVER hear judgement of the father for getting involved with a woman with other children. Usually, so long as he doesn't treat the other children like crap, he's just about lauded as a hero for having the courage and kindness to be able to love a woman with other children. Or something.

I trust I don't need to say that women's sexuality is highly stigmatized and denigrated in our society, and that children are the ultimate proof of sexuality. Do I? Because it is. So of course, that's another layer on the judgment cake.

And lastly, the thing that all ties it together with a big fucking bow is the fact that as a society, monogamy is viewed as moral whereas anything else is not. There is a book called The Ethical Slut, which for some in the poly community was their first introduction into polyamory. There is no book that I have heard of (and certainly none which are known in the monogamous community with the same type of recognition) called The Ethical Prude. Because, *obviously* prudishness is ethical. It's like when I heard the criticism of the phrase "white trash" where someone pointed out that specifying someone is "WHITE trash" implicitly assumes that people of color are trash, so you don't even need to put an identifying marker when talking about them. Same goes for The Ethical Slut, but in reverse: in our culture there is no need to write a book about how to ethically be monogamous, because it is assumed to be the case by default(even though lots of mongamous people treat their partner's terribly, or hurt their partner in petty little ways without noticing).

A couple months ago, in a paper to talk about one of my cases, I chose one where I had fucked up. I had assumed that someone had been raised by hir mother, because I have had the privilege of having been raised by an intact family, and my parents never were in a situation where they were too poor to feed themselves and their children, my parents never *needed* to give me to someone else to raise in order for me to eat. My privilege got in the way of my discussion with that client.
With hir partner, however, I was immensely prepared, because as zie was telling me (somewhat shamefully) about hir father and his multiple children, and how zie had 12 half-siblings (or whatever the number was), I was able to to bypass the step my supervisor would have needed, of judging and then working around that judgment. Because that's the topping on the cake for me, while my colleagues might (and many don't) acknowledge that classism or racism play a role in how they treat their clients, NONE of them seem to acknowledge how monogamism** plays a role in how they treat their clients.

I have classism that I have to conciously combat when working with my clients. I have racist ideas that I have to conciously combat when working with my clients. I have ableist ideas that I have to conciously combat when working with my clients.

What I don't have? Polyphobia. And unlike my coworkers and peers, I know that it exists and that it hurts people.


*in this case I believe Asian families would be partially immune
** like it? I just made it up. Do people know of a better word?

Apologies

I've been feeling sort of guilty because my resurgence of blog activity is so me, me, me focused. Which is silly, because who else would write this blog if not me? (If I were cool, right now I'd introduce a new guest blogger/co-blogger, but I'm not, so.... life sucks and then everyone dies, eh?)

I guess I mean that recently most of my blogged about thoughts have been about straightness and queerness, transness and cisness, and well, that's about it. But actually I've been spending a whole lot of time thinking about able-ist crap (Amanda Palmer's new project comes to mind, as do the awesome writings of FWD/Forward), and some racism stuff (I have thoughts about why Tiger Wood's whatever has become such a big fucking deal, and guess what, they relate to him being a person of color), and then of course there are other thoughts, like my incessant nagging depression, and the fact that the house needs to get cleaned, and what's going on with the dog, and how the hell do I expect myself to be a good social worker/foster parent/force for social justice/insert positive thing here, when I'm plagued with a constant hatred of myself and the idea that I'm basically a pretty worthless person who might be better off if I were, say, non-existent (oh hey, I just repeated myself, this is my depression in a nutshell!), and what to make for dinner.

I'm also spending a good chunk of my time thinking about all the things I want to do once I get my (apparently magical?) Masters in Social Work, like: set up a kitchen where people who are homeless/temporarily homeless can cook their own food free of charge and eat a meal without it being this big deal (because generally food that is easy to eat standing up/while moving/without a stove or even a microwave isn't all that healthy/nutritious, and while some people who can prove they are homeless can get "special" food stamps benefits letting them buy premade warm mac & cheese or mashed potatoes, lots of people can't and therefore can only buy needing-to-be-boiled pasta, even though they don't have a stove/running water), or set up a "pro-bono" type of thing where licensed therapy type people go into jails where mentally ill criminals are basically just stored, and give them real honest to goodness therapy to help them, and having a really good home-based therapy program especially for people suffering from PTSD and those who are dealing with sexual assualt/rape, (because hey, I know I won't be a victim blamey jackass, unlike apparently the vast majority of other therapists in the world), and how about a really actually non-judgmental drop in place for pregnant people who may not have intended to be pregnant where we'll give totally even-handed information about adoption and abortion and keeping a child, (and regardless of what you choose we'll help you do it, including months of therapy after whatever decision you make comes to fruition, and if you want to give a child up for adoption we'd also help you find prospective parents and be non-classist and not transphobic and ok with polyamory and such, and if you want to keep the child and funds are a problem we'll work our asses off to find you clothing and services and food and housing and, and if you want an abortion we'll drive you to the place), and yeah, I have a lot of ideas.

I just sort of want to fix the world and be perfect. Which, I've been told is not possible, and hoping/expecting that from myself may in fact be a problem.

So, I guess this is a "sorry" for not writing enough about racism and able-ism.

And even though I know you think is silly: sorry for not being perfect and fixing the world.

Some more privilege from the social work front lines

Something that gets discussed a lot in the "helping professions" (and specifically I'm going to talk about those who work as or plan to work as, therapists) is "disclosure."

"Disclosure" (as I'm going to talk about it, and as mostly discussed in social work) is the act of telling a client/patient something about oneself which is personal/not physically obvious (sort of, we'll get to it a little more in a sec). Freud believed that therapists (well psychoanalysts) should be a totally blank slate for their clients/patients and therefore it was necessary to not tell them anything humanizing/personal.

Now, Freud's an asshole, and most social workers (thank goodness) that I've met also agree that he's an asshole (though apparently there are far too many who think that "yes, but, for the time he wasn't"... no no, really, he rather was), but the field still tries to keep things a little more professional, a little more aloof than a friendly relationship would make, in keeping with some of his ideas about disclosure.
Which makes sense, it's harder emotionally to try to bill a friend than it is to bill a client/patient. Plus, some of our clients have a tendency to take the things they learn about us and sometimes use them in inappropriate ways (not that this isn't often the case for friends and family). Lastly, there's the fact that telling a client all about our father's recent death (or whatever) takes the focus off of them and places it onto us, which makes it harder for both client and social worker to you know, figure out what's going on for the client. So, lots of potentially good reasons to not disclose too often, or without some solid thought behind the reasons for doing it.

However, let's think for a second here about what constitutes "disclosing." Being straight? Not something usually disclosed. Being cisgender? Also rarely if ever disclosed. Being socially normative in a desire to have children? Not generally disclosed.

And it isn't that they aren't disclosed because straight people and cis* people, and people who fall into socially normative desires to have children are really good about keeping those things hidden/secret. HAH! (I laugh at the thought).
No no, they aren't disclosed because there is literally NO NEED to disclose in our society. It'd be like me disclosing to my clients that I'm human.

REALLY??? My social worker is HUMAN!?! I had NO IDEA (They would say).

They aren't disclosed because, except for in very specific situations (working at a center for trans/queer youth, for instance), everyone assumes those things to be true. Some identities are already known, and you have to prove them otherwise, by disclosing.

I'll give another example. I was chilling with a client the other day (like ya do) when she asked me whether I have children. My only decision at that point in time was "do I tell her or not?" It didn't include "do I tell her I don't want to raise children?" I didn't even think of the second idea, because it's a) "normal" to want to raise children, and b) I do want to raise some, maybe, someday. I have that privilege, of being able to let people assume I want to have kids, without even thinking about the fact that they are assuming it.

So in class we're talking about Freud, and someone in the class thinks he's just a peach, and had really ground breaking ideas, blah blah. And I mention that I think he's rather an asshole. And then later as we're about to move on from a discussion of disclosure, I bring up the fact that though I agree that it's important to not overshare with clients, that it seems really unfair to me that only certain groups are asked to be constantly on guard like that.

Which is when "Freud is awesome" classmate pipes in that it isn't the case that only certain groups are meant to not disclose, but that everyone is meant to not do it. She then goes on to tell me that as a former teacher, she also had to keep certain things about her life hidden from her students and that "you just have to get used to the idea of putting certain things about yourself up on the shelf".


As if I didn't just say that disclosure is a touchy subject. As if I was a wayward child who just is greedy, wanting to not feel like I have to keep my trans status, my sexual orientation, my atheism, the fact that I'm poly, hidden.

Yeah. Social workers sometimes don't talk about their kids with their clients, but a lot mention that they have them. (And, as a kid of a teacher I call TOTAL bullshit on just about ANY teacher not talking about their kids, my mom has a picture of me and my sister up on her door ya'll). And when you say you have kids, the client assumes you're straight. So if you're straight and have kids you just disclosed that you're straight, without even realizing it. Because you have that privilege.

My classmate is certain that she'll be a better social worker than me because she doesn't have all this "baggage." She understands that when you're a social worker you have to hide parts of yourself and keep identities hidden and not put lots of stuff on your clients by telling them all about yourself.

But the fact is, she's already told EVERYONE that meets her that she is straight/cis/what have you. She just doesn't realize that she did it.

So who's the overly disclosing one now, asshole?

Nostalgia for things that don't exist

So looking at my recent youtube videos, someone might think that I tend to like Tim Minchin's work. Which is... true? I enjoy those songs of his which seem more heartfelt and less just to be jokes on piano.
I also have listened to some of his stuff that frankly I find troubling, such as a song of his where he starts out the song stating that it's about prejudice and including the letters of a specific slur that he finds troubling. For people (unlike myself) who quickly catch onto this particular opening, he seems to be referencing the N-word. However as soon as the song starts instead he says "only a ginger can call another ginger 'ginger'." Which, ya know, seems to be making light of racism directed against Black people and the history of how Black Americans have been treated by white society, and the very complex struggles that go on within and around Black communities in regards to the ability or desire to reclaim a word used throughout its life in an oppressive way, by comparing it to being a redhead. So that's, um, not so cool?

Anyway, which is all to say that I find him very hit or miss (for my tastes), and that this following song of his, which has been making the atheist blog rounds (and other people's? I don't know) for the past couple months is another hit.

Sort of.

It's certainly very moving, being about the importance of connection and love and well, I'll just let you hear/read it yourself and then get to my personal difficulties with it:

[visual for the entire video is: a picture of comedian/pianist Tim Minchin standing on top of a black grand piano at one of the side edges. He is looking behind himself over the edge of the right side of the piano. The piano's keycover is up, showing us the keys. Tim is wearing all dark blacks and browns, with his customary teased/"messy" hair. He is white and skinny.]

[piano, quiet, with quiet lyrics sung in Australian accent] I really like Christmas, it's sentimental I know, but I just really like it.
I am hardly religious:
I'd rather break bread with Dawkins than Desmond Tutu, to be honest. [audience laughter]
And yes I have all of the usual objections to consumerism,
to the commercialization of an ancient religion, to the westernization of a dead Palestinian press-ganged into selling Playstations and beer.
But I still really like it.

I'm looking forward to Christmas,
though I'm not expecting a visit from Jesus.
I'll be seeing my dad, my brother and sisters, my gran and my mum:
they'll be drinking white wine in the sun.
I'll be seeing my dad, my brother and sisters, my gran and my mum:
they'll be drinking white wine in the sun.

[piano swells, violins added and lyrics sung more strongly]

I don't go in for ancient wisdom,
I don't believe just 'cause ideas are tenacious it means that they're worthy.
I get freaked out by Churches:
some of the hymns that they sing have nice chords, but the lyrics are spooky.
And yes I have all of the usual objections to the miseducation of children who in tax-exempt institutions are taught to externalize blame,
and to feel ashamed, and to judge things as plain right or wrong.
But I quite like the songs.
I'm not expecting big presents.
The old combination of socks, jocks, and chocolates is just fine by me.

'Cause I'll be seeing my dad, my brother and sisters, my gran and my mum:
they'll be drinking white wine in the sun.
I'll be seeing my dad, my brother and sisters, my gran and my mum:
they'll be drinking white wine in the sun.

[piano builds again, and violins swell]
And you my baby girl, my jet-lagged infant daughter,
you'll be handed 'round the room, like a puppy at a prim'ry school,
and you won't understand, but you will learn some day,
that wherever you are and whatever your face,
these are the people who make you feel safe in this world, my sweet blue-eyed girl.

And if my baby girl, when you're twenty one or thirty one,
and Christmas comes around,
and you find yourself nine thousand miles from home,
you'll know whatever comes: [violins drop out momentarily]
your brothers and sisters and me and your mum will be waiting for you in the sun, whenever you come [violins building again, it's quite a tear-jerking moment, which I say in full honesty], your brothers and sisters, your aunts and your uncles, your grandparents, cousins, and me and your mum will be waiting for you in the sun, drinking white wine in the sun,
darling when Christmas comes,
we'll be waiting for you in the sun,
drinking white wine in the sun,
waiting for you in the sun, waiting for yoouuu.... [violins swell]
waiting... [violins come to a close with piano]
[quiet, as in beginning] I really like Christmas, it's sentimental I know... [piano slowly plays a few arpeggiated chords] [audience applause]

as always, as complete a transcript as I can make

When I listened to it the very first time, I found myself feeling nostalgic and heartwarmed, until it got to the bit about his infant daughter. Which I think is also supposed to be very heartwarming and inspiring and what-not, and probably for a lot of people does manage that. But I was suddenly struck by "these are the people who make you feel safe in this world," since for so many children in the foster care system, or who are neglected or abused or who are witnesses to family violence (which technically in MA is considered neglect), family isn't this thing that makes you feel safe. For them it can be terrifying.
It's so beautiful and moving that he thinks of this tiny human life as something worth protecting and nurturing, but all I could think of was my clients, and the clients of all the many other workers in my office, and all the clients of all the workers in all the many other offices even just in the Boston area, and all the clients of all the workers in all the offices in MA, and across the country, and you get the idea. And how (some/many) of their parents just don't, or can't, protect and nurture a child so they feel safe and loved by their parents.

Which is heartbreaking.
Really, I'm tearing up because I work in an office with tens of cubicles, each filled with 4 or more social workers, each worker with approximately 20 cases, so at a very conservative estimate there are 800 families at this moment involved with just the DCF office of Dorchester. And most of these families have more than 2 kids. So we'll say 1600 kids at any time involved with us for anything from the fact that they have literally no family, to them being sexually assaulted by family members.
Which is terrifying.

And then to a lesser extent (and after writing the other stuff, this feels so petty, but it's also true) I was also struck by wondering how he knows that this infant child of his will grow up to be a girl/woman, and the fact that I even though I love my family and appreciate them and know that they care for me, they aren't the people in this world that I feel safest with. Because I'm always on edge and anxious about how right they'll get stuff. And I thought of lots of other gay/trans kids around the world who have loving families that they love as well, who might also just not feel safest with their family. Because they're always on edge and anxious. And all the other groups of people, who for whatever reason are the odd-ones out of their families, who may still love their family, but still have to worry about whether THIS family gathering they're going to have to deal with something huge that'll emotionally knock them on their asses. I don't know.

I guess this song just makes me nostalgic for a family that I don't even know if it exists. Does it? Are there families where all the children grow up and feel unconditionally loved and cared for and *safe*? It scares me that I have to ask.

But the song sure is pretty.

Blog Update

So, since I last was seriously blogging, some major changes have happened in my life. For instance, I no longer have interesting stories to tell about how I had to totally bite my tongue, for fear of losing my job at the computer lab, due to some horribly bigoted thing that someone said.

Instead I have stories about how some social workers/social work students say really privileged shit without thinking about it. Some fine paraphrased examples in the past few months:

In relation to my question about how the Department of Children and Families handles trans and queer youth in the foster system, as in, if they find out which kids are and have policies about how to place them, I was told "Oh, well, I don't know? But I'm sure since this is a liberal field office that everything's just fine"

and by a classmate who overheard me talking about how some *other* classmate's comments in a different class had made me feel super exoticized/like I was in a human zoo "oh, but I DO think you're exotic. Don't you think everyone's exotic?!"

Luckily for my ability to maintain emotional equilibrium, I am able to call out my classmates, and in fact responded to the prior individual by angrily telling her that there was "not a single thing that you as a straight person do which I find exotic. I find straight people Boring. You BORE ME" (which, while harsh, and not entirely true, was quite cathartic to say to someone who thought it was hunky dory to fetishize me as some exciting totally foreign and unique and thrilling experience)


Anyway, which is just a long winded way for me to let ya'll know that these days I'm in a masters program in social work.