Thanks for joining in the conversation, Janell. My writing tends to juke one way and run the other! I appreciate your perspective and astute observations. I'm onboard with liberation purposes too, to this end ... probably I see a little of both that and the bootstrap doctrine, which has taken on a bit of a polarizing context.

I remember feeling just as queasy when, during the last presidential election, media broke down a specific demographic: the uneducated white vote. Educated or not, rural or city, black or white, young or old, all voices count when you vote.