respectfully, and with the entire empathy of someone who actively agrees with you: please vote blue. not-voting or voting third party is not how you stage a strike or get your voice heard. (it is, in fact, actually the opposite). it will not help the people of palestine. it may even prevent us from helping - the president chooses important representatives such as diplomats, policy makers, and supreme court justices.
i agree. what is happening is a genocide. i am doing everything in my personal power to help palestine. i hope you are too. i am not your enemy here, i am working alongside you.
but i am also brutally, tragically aware that this election matters. we are not up against a random republican. we are up against a brainwashed cult of hundreds of thousands of american voters who actively love their idol. other republicans cannot even run - trump has inspired devotion to a degree that is rabid and unchecked. his people do not care about innocent lives and do not have the moral quandary we do. they have a savior. they are people who will vote.
i cannot turn my back on the work we have to do at home, too. i saw what life was like with him as president, and that means i cannot be a single-issue voter about this. i cannot abandon my support of disabled americans. of queer americans. of immigrants and refugees. of people of color; particularly black americans who had to survive a president who saw a BLM protest as a press opportunity. i cannot ignore how many people have been forced to give birth. i cannot ignore the children locked in cages. i cannot - however fucking much they want me to - forget the over one million americans that have died to covid. those are human people. they were written off as collateral damage to capitalism. just so we could go to Target.
the scope of the religious fervor within his followers should be fucking terrifying to you. he was just shot onstage. did you know his followers are wearing bandages "in solidarity" to his hurt ear? did you know he's saying god protected him? did you know he's already strongly implying that the "left" somehow did it? this is how you create a martyr, an idol. this is how you create a god. this is not a man you can critique or condemn: he surrounds himself with sycophants and moneylenders. you will have no one to call.
there isn't another train coming. someone very likely will be voted into power in november, and america is (through imperialism) a global superpower. the choices our future president makes are genuinely important. i know it feels stupid to say there is anything important outside of palestine. but long-term, legitimate concerns like climate change do matter.
and trump is standing to win, and his people would let him do whatever he wanted. forever. they amassed an army to storm the capitol last time. they have committed acts of violence in his name. nazi proud boys have become emboldened. this is a man who has threatened to open fire on peaceful countries. who has called for violence against people who mock him. this is a man who wants war. and where the left is defeated and divided, his people are united in rage & bigotry. they do not question him. they see "genius" in his every failure and lie. he has radicalized his nation. he has encouraged a distrust of journalism. he has repeatedly upheld christian nationalist beliefs. i don't care what he says: he will pull people into power that will make project 2025 happen. for enough money, this man would sell our country.
i have watched actually thousands of people constantly rise to his defense. i have seen actually thousands buy his propaganda and then turn around and peddle it. they are going to vote for him. they will put him in power. they see themselves as being martyrs and heroes, too. in 2016, too much of this nation believed "nobody would be stupid enough to really vote for trump." in the last 10 years, his vitriol and poison has only expanded. i am begging you. i know you must have seen how many people so violently agree with him. if you believe in nothing else: believe that the rage that fuels his people is more than enough. it cannot be allowed to decide our nation's leader.
and that's the thing: it is a civic duty and a job we are preforming. i am not asking you to love or to cherish our president. i am not asking you to forget or to stop acting. i am asking you to do your job as a citizen and make a choice. i am asking you to take stock of the entire picture, and do your best with the situation as-it-stands. maybe it will change. i hope it will. who knows.
i'm sorry to say it so plainly but: we cannot sacrifice the safety of american minority populations in our desire for change. you are not punishing the right people. the people who you have historically wanted to protect - those are the people who will be hurt first. this is not a hypothetical situation. data shows that trump's campaigning and election had a direct correlation with a significant rise in hate speech and hate crimes. you are putting minority populations at risk.
i love you. i am doing my best, and i know you are too. we are fighting on the same side. i am not happy with the situation either. but until some real option presents itself, i have to see politics as a long game. in 2 years, what do i want this world to look like? how can i realistically get there? how can i know that i tried?
please. please. it is more complicated than "doing what's right." it's doing what's necessary. i don't know how to make this country better. but i will, for whatever it's worth - genuinely try.
