(This post may contain disputed claims. We make no assertions as to the validity of the information presented by our Opinion Columnist. We are an opinion blog, not a traditional news outlet, and this post should be treated as such. Enjoy.)Michelle Obama loves to portray her childhood as poor and underprivileged. While speaking to a group of college-bound kids at the sixth annual College Signing Day, the former first lady pandered to the crowd peddling her “fake ghetto status” by donning a t-shirt. In fact, her reasoning for wearing the tee made no sense at all. Don’t miss this.
Michelle Obama appeared at 9th annual College Signing Day where she addressed 9,000 college-bound students. Strangely, she was donning a “Compton College” t-shirt, and even the Daily Mail reported the former first lady was “Straight Outta Compton.”
Well, maybe we shouldn’t be surprised. In her memoir “Becoming,” Michelle claims she was poor and a minority. “Michelle Obama’s tales of applying to and enrolling in Princeton are emblematic of an all-too-common narrative for low-income and minority students, particularly those at elite institutions,” reports the Atlantic.
However, was Michelle low-income? Was she disadvantaged?
“Let’s get this straight. Barack Obama never knew a life of financial hardship. Ditto for Michelle. But the [former] First Couple keeps bringing up their impoverished childhoods and student loan debts,” reports the American Thinker.
“Michelle’s story of economic misfortune is no more believable than her husband’s. She was middle-class all the way. Her father’s yearly salary as a city worker exceeded the average teacher’s income. Mrs. Obama lived in a middle-class neighborhood with a stay-at-home mom,” the American Thinker added.
“Michelle was from a middle-class family,” confirmed one of her long-time friends, Angela Acree. “She came from a regular family. They had a nice home. It wasn’t a mansion, but it was just fine. It was a decent neighborhood.”
So, the former Michelle Robinson didn’t grow up in a low-income area like she loves to claim. That brings us to Michelle telling the college-bound kids that she and Barack are getting out of their way.
“People like me and Barack are stepping out of the way, to allow you guys to take the lead and in order to be those leaders you’ve got to be ready,” Michelle said.
“I had someone tell me that I shouldn’t reach too high,” she said. “They told me that I wanted too much for myself, I should dream a little smaller. In those times—because they will come up—you have to ask yourselves whether you’re gonna believe the haters or whether you’re gonna believe the own truth of your story,” she added.
So, when Michelle goes on talking about her “struggles” of growing up in the “rough Southside of Chicago” and implies her neighboorhood was some ghetto, it’s just not true. And it was really telling she decided to wear a “Compton College” t-shirt at her appearance in Los Angles.
“Obama pointed out that she was wearing a Compton College shirt because she wanted to give community colleges ‘a little extra love’,” the Daily Mail reported.
“We are fortunate in this country to have an amazing community college system, and Compton College has a great story to tell,” she said. “The school fell on some tough times a few years ago, but they buckled down, they worked hard and now they’re back on their feet.”
“They’re showing once again that you just don’t count out folks from Compton,” she added. Compton College actually lost its accreditation, and it was a real scandal as the first public college in California to do so. They managed to get re-accredited in 2017.
And those are nice sentiments from the former first lady, but what do they have to do with the college-bound kids she was addressing?
First, anytime anyone sees “Compton” on anything, sadly people think of the ghetto, gangsta rap, and gangland murders. Apparel with “Compton” on it implies the gang lifestyle. And the truth is the kids Michelle addressed were all there for “College Signing Day,” and it’s safe to say no one “signs” to go to Compton College.
Hey, I am not putting Compton down. My family is from Compton. My parents went to Compton College. But I find Michelle Obama wearing a Compton College t-shirt as a way to pander to this myth she was from the ghetto herself, and just like the media outlets said, she’s “Straight Outta Compton,” proving that’s what this was all about.
