The 2024 Election and Beyond

It's been just over a week since the election, and I'm still processing, but feel the need to get my thoughts out so I can deal with them better. I apologize now if they are all over the place. It may also be interesting in the future to look back on this moment and see how I was feeling in this time of transition.

Although transition is a strange thing. I saw an interview I related to with an athlete recently where he described his support for his trans-daughter as a transition for him, not for her. She simply is who she is, and he had to adapt and change based on a shift in his own expectations. 

That's how I'm feeling about our nation right now, but in a harsh kind of light instead of an uplifting one.

I want to rage against the foolishness and cruelty. I want to see people who voted against their own interests have it boomerang back in their faces. I want the people down the street with their "Trump 2024: Fuck your feelings" flag to understand how much worse they made our neighborhood for so many kids on the block. 

But I also need to decide who I am, and who I want to be. That person isn't hateful. That person doesn't revel in the pain of others or seek revenge. That person wants fairness and compassion for everyone, even for people who don't want to extend it to me.

That's hard to manage at a time where the presidency is being used as a get-out-of-jail-free card, "Your body, my choice" is trending on social media, and things are looking frighteningly similar to Germany in the 1930s.

I hear a lot of people expressing shock that things have changed so drastically. And I am not going to downplay that, since I think respect for rule of law is gone and we are headed into a dark time for many, not just here, but everywhere.

However, I think what we are seeing is what was always here. America was built on lofty ideals paid for with genocide and slavery. There have been advances and change, which are the parts of my country that I had pride in, but we've never paid those early debts or healed any wounds. 

What we are looking at now is white supremacy without filters.

The same people that are here today were here a few weeks ago. I'm just seeing them differently, because this isn't a disagreement over politics, it's a fundamental split over morality.

If you voted for Trump, you have made this world less safe for people I care about, and I cannot forgive that. 

If you voted for Trump, you voted against decency. You threw my daughters under the bus for what you hope will be lower prices, even though on a global level we have one of the highest standards of living in the world already. Instead of asking why things are expensive, we should be asking why people aren't paid properly for their labor so they can afford what they need. 

If you voted for Trump, you voted against the environment. Places and animals and plant species will be destroyed that will be gone forever, and that is unconscionable.

If you voted for Trump, you did it for reasons that boil down to greed and indifference to other people's suffering.

If you voted for Trump, I no longer trust you. I don't know yet if you can earn it back.

I am angry. I feel helpless. I am ashamed of the path our country is on.

I'm a cis-het white woman raised in a white community. I'm sure I still don't fully understand my privilege, but being thrust into a vulnerable space post-election, it's clearer than it was before. I've taken the level of freedom many of us enjoy for granted.

For perspective, I've been thinking a lot about the African-American community. They did not, on the whole, appear to have the same gut wrenching reaction in 2016 that white liberal voters did, because they never expected a difference in their own outcomes based on the choices offered. Even a cursory glance over Black History in this country shows a system that has dehumanized and terrorized black people here from the start. White supremacy requires we don't look at that. Which is why I hadn't heard of the Tulsa Massacre until nearly it's 100th anniversary, and why Oklahoma public schools are only allowed to teach about it if they somehow omit race from the discussion. We may have the 24th amendment to address poll taxes, but we still have the 13th that provides a loophole for slave labor if people are in prison. You just have to look to Tamir Rice (and a long list of others) to know we have not progressed from Emmett Till. Abuses of "medicine" in Tuskegee may technically be in the past, but higher mortality rates for pregnant women in the African-American community regardless of income is alive and well. Red lining, how education is funded, stop and frisk, the fact that I should be able to look around the orchestras I play in and see faces that reflect my city at large and yet seldom do I get to play with black musicians despite Milwaukee only being about a third white, are all evidence that we have a fundamental problem. 

Racism is this country's original sin. Sexism is its adopted abused sister.

There is an enormous amount of inspiration to be taken from the experience of black people in America. American culture is black culture. Jazz, Blues, Hip-hop, innovations in dance, art, fashion, food, comedy, writing... All created in pockets of community within a hostile culture at large, where lynchings still happen and the police and courts are viewed as a threat rather than protection. That's true for other communities that suffer oppression here, from LGBTQ+ communities, to Hispanic culture, to the indigenous people whom this country has tried to annihilate in every conceivable way and which persist regardless.

So here we are in 2024, and as depressed as I (justifiably) feel about many things, I remember history is a long story of injustice and imperfection and suffering. We've been lucky to live in a time and place where incredible possibilities have existed and wondrous things are occasionally achieved. Can I really look at friends who have come here from places like Cuba and Venezuela, or talk to people whose relatives survived the Holocaust, or read stomach churning news about women trying to survive under the Taliban without losing their lives or their minds, and really give up hope here?

I am not that delicate, or callous.

I've turned away from the news lately because there is only so much I can take without feeling the physical effects of panic. That helps no one. I've turned toward more music, which is better for my soul anyway. The song with lyrics that resonate with me the most when I am at my darkest moments is The Heart of Life by John Mayer. I only seem to find this song when I'm feeling overwhelmed, and it reduces me to tears while making me feel I need to get up and keep going.

If we are lucky, the pendulum will eventually swing the other way. Not until a lot of damage that can't be undone has happened, but there is hope the system will remain and give us another chance to advance toward things like "diversity, equality, and inclusion" which have somehow been distorted into something to fear rather than strive for in our society. I suspect the people coming into power will not find it as easy to govern as they imagine. They don't have a mandate as much as they have a facile and demanding electorate that they can't deliver as many of their promises to as they believe.

If we are unlucky, and there is no more pendulum to swing as the system collapses into chaos, then collectively we didn't deserve it. I don't know what comes next. I will just do the best I can. I recommend people read the Declaration of Independence if you haven't recently. The list of grievances against the king is eerily familiar. Maybe if it all falls apart, we can divide up and reboot. I'll choose the side that actually believes in the Constitution, because despite its myriad flaws, it's still an excellent blueprint for creating a decent society.

When I talked to my oldest child who was looking at the election results from her college dorm room and feeling scared, it took tremendous effort to find words to share with her. Her dad told her we'd be okay, but that misses the point. As a straight white man in America, of course he'll be okay. He's not being targeted, so even as he's worried for us and others, it doesn't hit him in the same visceral way it does, say, women, who already weren't seeing justice for rape victims now watching a sexual abuser being elevated to the White House for the second time by people who somehow don't care.

I did not tell my daughter it was going to be okay, because much of it won't be. This is hard, and any decent person witnessing the destruction that is coming should be upset. However, I told her that even though millions of people voted for Trump, almost as many millions did not. Those people are still here, and still willing to do the right thing. I told her she has a family that will circle the wagons to protect her, and any of her friends who need to feel safe. I told her we will do the best we can. I reminded her there is still beauty in the world, and good people, and there is always hope as long as we choose it. The things we loved yesterday are still here today, and they are worth protecting. That's our job now.

What am I going to do going forward? The same as before. I will make things, fix things, help people in front of me who need it, and try to leave the world a little better today than yesterday if I can. 

I can only control myself. I cannot reason with people who want to believe in lies, or whitewash history, or who don't have enough imagination or empathy to understand that there are needs beyond their own, or ways of life that are as equally valid as what they have been taught to value.

I will not let the greed and recklessness of others rob me of joy and appreciation of this one life I get to live. I am disgusted and disappointed in my country, but it is still my home, and I will try in my own small way to make it what I think it should be: A decent place where freedom is protected for everyone.