Una Mullally: Feminism and politics in poverty-hit South Bronx

In the South Bronx last Thursday, the sun was setting behind one of the colossal blocks of flats that dominates the otherwise low-lying skyline. At Saint Mary’s Park, Bernie Sanders was holding a rally. More than 15,000 people turned up.

It’s two weeks until the New York primary, a crucial battle between Sanders and Hillary Clinton. In many ways, Sanders can’t lose. If Clinton edges the primary, everyone will say it should have been a more comfortable victory. If Sanders edges it, it will be a massive wobble for Clinton and another burst of momentum for Bernie.

There was an almost festival vibe at the rally. The mostly young, racially diverse crowd chilled out on a grassy slope, waiting for their man, the occasional whiff of marijuana on the breeze, conversations about intersectionality between young feminists, white guys addressing black guys as “brother”.

Two women from his campaign were first to speak, one African-American, one an undocumented Mexican-American. There was a female nurse’s union activist. Actor Rosario Dawson introduced director Spike Lee. Sanders himself was introduced by René Pérez Joglar aka Residente of the Grammy Award-winning Puerto Rican band Calle 13.

More than half a million people live in the South Bronx. About 60 per cent are Hispanic and 39 per cent black. It’s the birthplace of hip-hop. “The Boogie Down!” Spike Lee roared into the mic, citing the Bronx’s nickname.

In 2010, the South Bronx was named the poorest congressional district in the US. If you want to talk about stark inequality, here is a good place to start. Half of all children in the South Bronx live in poverty, a startling statistic when a few stops away on the subway are the pristine millionaire neighbourhoods of Manhattan, a borough where the average price for an apartment is now $1.9 million.

A survey last week showed Clinton beating Sanders by 54 per cent in New York, but a more interesting piece of polling was on who New Yorkers actually liked – rather than who they would support – in the primary. Nearly half (49 per cent) of those polled had an unfavourable view of Clinton and 45 per cent held a favourable view. In contrast, 54 per cent held a favourable view of Sanders and only 30 per cent held a negative opinion of him.

Forever female

When it comes to gender, politics is much like the arts. Female artists have to spend a lot of time talking about being female artists, making work about being women, having their audience generalised as female and their perspective viewed as filtered through a female lens.

From comedians to novelists to pop stars, answering questions about whether or not they are feminists is the anti-bonus burden of being a female “creator”.

Men just get to be artists. They can write books and tell jokes and paint pictures without being asked about their gender, or how their work tells a story about being a man in the world.

Bernie Sanders is a candidate. Hillary Clinton is a female candidate. As racist as America is, an African-American man succeeded over a woman as the 2008 candidate. As right-wing as America is, it is now cocking its ear to a guy talking about socialism. The accusations levelled at Clinton from Sanders supporters are perfectly legitimate – Establishment Hillary, Wall Street Hillary, War Hillary.

I wandered around the rally speaking to female supporters. The one thing they kept mentioning about Sanders was “consistency”.

Now, and for the best part of a decade, Clinton remains the main viable female presidential candidate. Women with better politics than her will emerge as candidates in her wake. In 227 years, America has had 43 male presidents of all kinds. We cannot expect Clinton to instantly be 43 kinds of president.

The question is, what would be more revolutionary for the world – Sanders and his politics as America’s president, or a woman as America’s president? Tough call, right?

For a country that loves to whoop, this was not a rally of bolshy cheerleaders. It was one of listeners and conversationalists.

Million-dollar bomb

I sat and chatted to a mother and daughter, African-American New Yorkers.

“As an older person – and I know they say young people are the people for Bernie, but I’m older,” the mother began, “I’m a former fan of the Clintons in the 90s, but we see the effects of the policies . . . I don’t think she’s very pro-woman at all.

“On one hand, she’s saying women’s rights are human rights, and in the next breath she’s bombing Syria and Libya. Women and children are fleeing into Europe right now, trying to get away from policies that she is very supportive of. I don’t see that as being pro-women. If you’re pro-women, you have to be for women in America, women in Libya, women in Palestine . . .

“We can’t spend all of our dollars overseas perpetuating continuous war in the Middle East over and over again. Those bombs are a million dollars. Do you know what a million dollars could do in the South Bronx?”