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African-American Congresswoman leads 'Women for World
Peace'
By Cindy Saine
Capitol
Hill March 22, 2011
U.S.
Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson is serving her 10th term
representing a Texas district that includes a large part of the city of
Dallas. She is the first nurse to be elected to the U.S. Congress and
has founded an initiative led by women, based on non-violent conflict
resolution, called "A World of Women for World Peace."
The congresswoman said that when she first arrived in Washington 20
years ago as a newly elected member of Congress, she had grown
accustomed to the challenges of being an African-American woman with an
important title while she was a member of the state legislature in
Texas.
"You know when you grow up in Texas as an African American, you build
some resilience. And so instead of always being angry, you really kind
of feel sorry for the ignorance of people."
Johnson said now, 20 years later, things have not changed that much, and
there are still some congressional staff members who snub her and treat
her as if she were a staff member instead of a veteran Congresswoman.
"You can always tell that if it is a person they are working for that
might have a few feelings, it is really expressed through their staff.
The disrespect, pushing you aside, and ignoring you on the elevator, or
not expressing any kind of courtesy, you know they are from some type of
ignorance and you just accept it as that."
In 2010, Congresswoman Johnson was elected as the first African-American
female ranking member of the House Committee on Science and Technology.
She said she strongly agrees with President Barack Obama that the United
States has fallen behind other countries on science and math education,
and this is impeding the ability to compete with other countries.
She said
the United States will not be able to compete on the world stage unless
it puts more emphasis on making sure American children have top quality
teachers.
"For some reason, we have not encouraged our most skilled people to go
to the classroom. So we have a number of good teachers, but teachers who
have not majored in the areas they are teaching, which handicaps them
and handicaps the students."
After the 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, Congresswoman
Johnson said she felt she had to do something to try to reduce violence
in the world, and that she believes women have a unique ability to work
as peacemakers throughout the world.
"One of the reasons why is, you know women give birth to these soldiers,
and the last thing that a woman wants to do is to see an offspring have
to go to war and get killed."
Johnson founded the "A World of Women for World Peace" initiative, which
includes a curriculum of conflict resolution for girls of all ages. She
said the program is based on respect for those who have different
beliefs.
"That is kind of our approach, is to respect those differences, allow
people to have their space to have those differences, and I have worked
with people in war-torn areas, from Bosnia to Afghanistan, Bahrain,
throughout Africa, Sudan women, Palestinian and Israeli women, and also
Iraqi women as well."
Johnson said in her travels to Africa and throughout the world, she
always seeks to meet with local women leaders. She said she has
suggested more women be included in peace negotiations between Israelis
and Palestinians, because she believes that conflict will never be
resolved without their input. |
