It’s only appropriate that an election opinion piece should run alongside the sex columns, because this piece will also be about getting fucked. I never really believed that a man so hateful could be elected, but it shows how much common sense can be trusted nowadays. Call it liberal tears, but based on the reactions of the people in my newsfeed, I feel as if I’m writing a eulogy.
This is what happens when you have a broken political system. This is what happens when politicians get so corrupt, Congress gets so deadlocked, and wealth disparity grows so large. I don’t know a single person, liberal or conservative, who has faith in the government. This isn’t just the white rural voters fault, this is the fault of every politician who decided to give him/herself a pay raise during a time of economic hardship, who voted for tax breaks for the wealthy and increased military spending instead of public education. It’s Hillary and the DNC’s fault for being all too happy to engage in corruption. It’s the fault of the politicians who’ve campaigned on the vote of working class America, but ignored its needs every single time. It’s the fault of the media who gave airtime to the fear mongerers who said without a single credible fact that our country is being taken over by Mexican immigrants and Islamic extremists.
So, to them I’d like to say congratulations. Congratulations to the people who’ve voted a joke into the presidency. Congratulations to the KKK who’ve elected the candidate they endorsed. Congratulations to Alex Jones and all his fellow conspiracy theorists who believe in the globalist “Jewish Mafia.” Congratulations to Rudy Guiliani, who compared Trump to the next Andrew Jackson, a president most known for the Trail of Tears.
You have what you want now. You have your white proto-male savior who is too manly to listen to the so-called “bleeding hearts” of the country like Black Lives Matter, environmentalists, Muslims and women. We can finally go back to the golden era of this country. Can’t you see how much better it was? Those gleaming fields of wheat waving pastorally as drive down the highway in Dad’s old Buick. A time when men were men, the economy was boomin’ (tax rates were far higher back then, but let’s ignore that), and it was okay to sexually harass your secretary. Ah, the good old days; true America. It’s like, all we hear about now is how black people feel marginalized. I don’t remember that ever being an issue back when America was great. Let’s get back to that era!
Because the white, aging population of America has come out and decided they know what’s best for our generation. So, let me take this time to thank the baby boomer generation that voted for Trump. Thank you. Thank you for voting for politicians who have made it harder for us to pay for college, who have cut taxes on the rich and let the average citizen struggle. Thank you for sending us to fight in two unnecessary wars. Thank you for that “drill baby drill” mentality, global deforestation and drought, and the depletion the ocean. Thank you for letting a narcissistic, petulant idiot gain access to the world-ending nuclear arsenal you saw fit to build. Don’t call our generation selfish and whiny when yours is the one who used up the earth’s resources.
Because, even forgetting about Trump’s utter disinterest in healing the social divides in this country, we have a climate change denier in officer. One who believes that there are too many restrictions on the fossil fuel industry, who wants more gas and oil and less renewable resources. A man who wants the U.S. out of the Paris Climate Agreement. A man who has called climate change a Chinese conspiracy, for fuck’s sake. We have no more time for this sort of insanity.
You know, I wanted to write something uplifting for today. Write about how politicians don’t make this country, the people do. I truly believe that. But I can’t just pretend that it’ll all get better through American grit and spirit. We have a problem. Because if there’s one thing this election has proved, it’s that facts no longer matter. Trump got elected on a campaign of feeling, lies, and fear mongering; not a single viable proposal or solid fact was a part of his platform. The media, who is supposed to champion truth, just let it happen. It is a dangerous precedent.
I don’t have an answer for this. I don’t know what a Trump presidency will look like. But now more than ever, we cannot let the voices of hate and ignorance drown out reason. Don’t waste time blaming the average Trump voter, work to end the systemic deceit in politics. Because if we don’t find a way to cut through this bullshit, red or blue, then this country is going nowhere but backwards.