This Presidential election has drawn some strong lines in the sand when it comes to who and how "Americans" want this country to be run. Especially after the biggest surprise since the Cubs winning the world series, Trump becoming the 45th President of the U.S.. What we have seen from all sides is a lot blaming, name calling, protest, violence, tears, and cheers. People have turned away from friends, family, and co-workers because of who one or the other chose to support. My question is why are we so angry or happy this time around? What makes this election seemingly so much more emotional to so many people than in previous elections. Even when President Obama was running to become the first African American President, I know their was outrage and elation on both sides, but I don't recall it being as visceral.
When I say visceral I mean that in the literal since. Visceral loosely means more focused on emotion than intelligence. First of all let's be honest, I am speaking directly to all those who are so offended by Trump becoming the new President. Especially to White American's that just can't believe Trump was elected, well let's take a good hard look at this. Out of the 45 Presidents, I will eliminate 2 and give you a Mulligan on the 3rd, Obama, Clinton, and possibly Bush #2, except for those three EVERY AMERICAN PRESIDENT WAS BIGOTED, MISOGYNISTIC, SEXIST, ELITIST, OLD, RICH, and WHITE (as I write this I realize I was wrong, add Clinton and Bush which makes the total 44 out of 45)!!!!! Why are you so surprised that Trump was elected? I mean you guys are really surprised and I find that funny because it seems as if you totally forgot about the other 43 presidents that are a carbon copy of the current presidential elect. You are now, but why not before? Where was the outrage when the Reagan administration was destroying as many minority families as the Jim Crow era? Where was the outrage win Bush one and two helped privatized prisons make millions off citizens? I won't even get into any President before 1980.
As for the Minority Americans and Immigrants, rich racist white men are to the presidency as the UConn women's basketball program is to women college basketball. In other words they will go on a ridiculous win streak, you might get 1 every so many years, but they will keep on winning. For example, let's start at Washington (1789-1797) rich racist white men all the way up to Lincoln (1861-1865) we got a break on the whole slavery thing. Then from Lincoln rich racist white mean until 2008, I will give you some slack for Bill Clinton (1992), that's it! From 1860 until 1993 all you got was freedom from slavery. My point, this is what America is, a country with great freedoms, and rights that were written and designed by rich old racist white men for their demographic. Their only struggle is how to exclude everyone while trying to make us feel like we are included.
I think the shock is that Trump is so bad at concealing the image of someone who gives a damn, where as we are used to candidates feeding us the B.S. sweetened with honey, Trump just gives us the 1960's I'm white, I'm rich, I'm a man, so I have earned this. Which effects different groups in different ways.
First, for White American that were against Trump, I get you don't want to be labeled in the same bag as that guy. You live in diverse communities, urban areas. You have plenty of minority friends and co-workers and you honestly don't have a bigoted bone or sexist bone in your body. Where you fell is that 100% know that oppression, segregation, sexism, etc. exist in this country yet 99% of you do absolutely nothing about. You are active in the community, schools, state, or country at a grass roots level working to eliminate these things. You vote and you say "well I'm active because I voted against the bad guy" but that's not enough and you know. And if you didn't know you know now because of how the rest of the White Americans voted. Which brings me to my second point.
To all the White Americans that voted for Trump kudos to you. You recognized that you took a loss with 2 Obama terms and made sure that American tradition stayed in tact. Trump reminded you what American freedom is truly about, being able to live the great White way without having to worry about all these different minority groups and women to worry about. You organized and did what you have always done which is out smart us at the polls and get the right person for the job for you. Him being racist didn't matter because he is a rich white man, derogatory attitude towards women, well that's what rich white men allowed to do, right? Don't pay taxes, not prove your wealth, openly racist, unpredictable, narcissistic, under qualified, well that's ok because he is rich, he is white, and he's a man.
For Minority Americans we have been exposed as lazy, unorganized, and uncaring. How many times have I heard "It don't matter who is in the office, they don't care about us. nothing that they do applies to me" yes this might be true, but the fact is 99% of us are not active in the voting process that do determine what will effect us. How many of you can name your local alderman, mayor, treasurer, states attorney, judges, sheriffs, congress person, or senate representative. These people make decisions based directly on how you vote. Your local taxes, laws, schools, park district programs, jobs, housing, businesses are all determined by these people. So when I hear " I don't vote because it doesn't apply to me", cringe at the out right stupidity of such a statement.
I mean we didn't even have a 100% turn out when Obama was running, now that should tell you something. This is also what hurt the democratic party. They assumed we would come out and vote like we did for Obama, but why we would come out to vote for people who are representations of the elitist class when not even 50% of the minority population came out when we had a minority representative. This is a huge problem for us, we have fallen and continue to fall for one of the great tricks of white supremacy, to continually think that are actions will be futile. Every time we have a chance to make significant change we get bombarded with this myth, only when we go past this and continue to take action do we see our true power, and this is really what they fear the most, us organized, working together, building coalitions, unifying different groups. The Majority has relinquished way more power than they wanted to and they will not give us anymore and will do their best to take back what we have struggled to achieve and maintain. Our job is the continual pursuit of equality, to pry away some of that power and resources to even the playing field.
My final thought is that I have no problem with the outrage and the elation from either side. I play a lot of sports and I understand stand that sometimes your opponent is just bigger and stronger than you and can't change that. What you have to do is figure out a way to win regardless of who your opponent is, if they are bigger than be faster, if they a faster then slow them down, if they are stronger beat them with sound fundamentals, but their tendencies, have a solid defense, make sure your team is unified and every one has their eyes on the same goal. The game of life is for keeps, no overtime when the buzzer sounds the game is over. Play to win.
