Why We Hate Politics and Partake in Them Anyways With Kelly and Emma Fryer
(Photo courtesy of Gettysburg College)
By Vanessa Igras, Staff Writer
On Wednesday, Oct. 7, the Office of LGBTQIA+ Life hosted a webinar analyzing the 2020 election cycle through a conversation with Kelly Fryer and Emma Fryer; a mother and daughter duo that managed to flip Arizona politics on its head. Through a discussion on the upcoming election, viewers engaged with the question of why women and LGBTQ+ folks should continue to partake in the political process, as polarizing and frustrating it may be.
With experience as a pastor, an educator, a non-profit leader, and even a candidate for governor in Arizona, K. Fryer led this political conversation. Her daughter, Emma Fryer is an international marketing and communication leader and acted as both the communication director and the campaign manager for K. Fryer’s campaign for Arizona governor.
Fryer’s political story began with her announcement in January 2018, that she was going to be a candidate for the governor of Arizona. Having driven 32,000 miles across Arizona, Fryer acknowledged that her campaign was “like no other on the state-wide level,” thus giving her “an interesting perspective on the issue at hand.”
With her experience in running a grassroots campaign, K. Fryer stated the primary reason why so many people hate politics is that it is all about the money.
“Right now in Arizona, we are in the middle of the U.S. Senate race. Mark Kelly is running against Martha Mcsally; this race will change the dynamics of the Supreme Court nomination,” K. Fryer said. “It will be the most expensive political campaign ever run in the state of Arizona … it’ll probably be a 40-50 million dollar campaign.”
K. Fryer mentioned that in Tuscan, she lived in the poorest county of its size; in fact, a nearby community had a poverty rate of 65%. Outraged, K. Fryer asked, “Can you think about the things we could do with 40-50 million dollars in the state of Arizona?”
Moving on, the extreme partisan play of politics is what E. Fryer mentioned being a great factor of hatred in many people’s eyes. She believed that this idea of “red team, blue team, is a way to distract and divide people.”
K. Fryer went on to say that she believed “that the people in charge are kind of hoping that we’re distracted by things like this [polarized partisanship] so that we’re paying less attention to some of the things that are going on [corruption].”
“Politics is usually about winning and not about people,” K. Fryer said, “where are the leaders?” According to Fryer, it is 2020 and so many things are still up for debate, including her rights as a woman and as a member of the LGBTQ+ community. For this reason, she elaborated, it is important to get involved and make politics about the people.
At this point in the conversation, they began to touch on the question, why do people engage in the political process, knowing what they know, and why should people continue?
“Every election cycle we are seeing more women, people of color and people who aren’t just straight white males,” E. Fryer said. “That fact is so inspiring.”
She continued to say that people should partake in politics for that reason: the government is slowly becoming more representative of the nation.
E. Fryer referenced her campaign and acknowledged that “although we did not win our race, we helped people see politics and themselves in a new way.”
“It makes a difference when you get involved,” she said, suggesting what more of a reason to partake in the political process than that.
