By Tessa Meehan
Article for The American Lawyer, An informed and trusted magazine publication of news, data, analysis and forecasting on the global business of law.
Freedom of Movement
Professor N is a gay, black man who works as an attorney and educator in California. In the eyes of an attorney, N shared his American Dream as a theory in which you can actively live in a democratic country with freedom from tyranny and dictatorship; with said freedoms translating your work into wealth. However, when we were to later discuss the idea of N’s personal American Dream, the lack of freedom of movement through his life due to identifying factors prevents him from painting one. Rather he just explained the frustrations behind the unequal footing our society has provided him with when it comes to achieving the American Dream.
While Jim Crow laws are ill-existent, -and never were fly recognized by the nation as a whole as national laws, legally people of color and members of the LGBTQ+ community have rights, yet this does not transfer socially. N’s ‘American Dream’ is affected by his demographics in the sense that he is prohibited from painting the average, idealistic, American family we see advertised. Understanding the American Dream of individuals whose rights in society are actively developing over time, it’s a frustrating phrase to listen to.
“How will our children be treated at school?”
Understanding marginalized groups in our nation are only beginning to be able to paint the future white, straight people have been building for years; now that they have been handed the right to participate legally, social discriminations stand in the way. If you were to describe to someone to paint the image in their mind of a successful, hard-working man in America working as both a professor and an attorney, they would most likely paint a happy family alongside it. However, when you add the identifying factors of ‘black’ and ‘gay’ to the mix, one’s image perspective shifts.
To fear for your own safety depending on what side of the street you walk down because of the color of your skin is not freedom of movement. To fear to start a family because of how said child will be treated in school coming from a family of gay men is not freedom of movement. N’s American Dream has adapted throughout his life the same way mine has and everyone else’s. The Founding Fathers did not think the American dream would be white picket fences in the suburbs, and we don’t anymore either. The phrase the American Dream is outdated and inaccurate because describing a vision without looking at the full picture is not telling the full
truth.
N is…
- 40 Years-Old
- Male, Cisgender
- Black
- Catholic
- Middle Class
- Gay