-By Warner Todd Huston
I must admit that I have some mixed emotions about this story of a woman who saw that other women didn’t have their own auto repair shops, so she decided to start one. There are several ways to think about the tale, granted, but none of them seem to rise to the need for a big splashy national news story on her business proposal.
So, the big deal story is offered to us by ABC News. It is the tale of entrepreneur Patrice Banks who claims that she was “dumbfounded” that there weren’t any auto repair shops run by women in her hometown of Philadelphia. So, she has triumphantly announced that she plans to open one of her own.
The news piece makes a big deal out of the fact that a woman wants to open a car repair shop. Once again it’s that whole women-empowering-women theme we are treated to.
But, after reading about her tale I feel nothing but a big dose of “so what?” coming on.
Firstly, we have to realize that this story is premature. After all, Patrice Banks is only saying she is going to open her chick friendly auto repair shop to empower all those women out there hungry for a woman-owned auto repair shop.
Secondly… well, again, SO WHAT?
Who cares if a woman opens an auto repair shop–or merely wants to–in Philadelphia? How is this a big deal national story?
But then my fealty to capitalism also pokes its nose into my thoughts telling me this is all fantastic. If a woman finds a niche in the auto repair business then, what the heck, more power to her!
Yes, I wish her all the luck in the world. I hope she succeeds and then I hope a hundred other women follow in her footsteps and succeed.
But… why should we care about it on a national level right now? I can see a story like this making national news after she succeeds at her enterprise. But not when she is merely thinking about it.
I once thought of being an astronaut, but I don’t think having a national story on it would have been of much use to the world.
I mean, is this what America has become? A place where we celebrate people as a big deal just because they throw around big talk like they want to do something, instead of a place that celebrates people when they actually achieve something?
So, Mz. Banks. I salute your ambition. But get back to me when you’ve made your first million dollars or opened a chain of chick auto repair garages.
Still, I have to say, it looks like she may have a nice rack. You know. To put cars up on and repair them and stuff.
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“The only end of writing is to enable the reader better to enjoy life, or better to endure it.”
–Samuel Johnson
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Warner Todd Huston is a Chicago based freelance writer. He has been writing news, opinion editorials and social criticism since early 2001 and before that wrote articles on U.S. history for several American history magazines. Huston is a featured writer for Andrew Breitbart’s Breitbart News, and he appears on such sites as RightWingNews.com, CanadaFreePress.com, Wizbang.com, and many, many others. Huston has also appeared on Fox News, Fox Business Network, CNN, and many local TV shows as well as numerous talk radio shows throughout the country.
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