I cannot understand how/why any decent human being would have even considered voting for him.
And yet, there are plenty of people I know who ARE decent, hardworking human beings. They are 100% wrong about anything and everything they thought Trump would do for them or our country or the world.
So at what point is it ok to ridicule the opinion of someone who clearly isn’t reaching their political opinions through reasoned discourse? Am I supposed to respect the opinion of some who is actively ignoring reality? Who chooses ignorance over honest introspection? I understand that there are plenty of hard-working, nice, good people out there with giant gaping holes in their ability to think logically when it comes to politics. And I understand that admonishing them for that likely isn’t going to Change their minds, more likely to make them more entrenched. But that’s not a good reason to not point out how ridiculous they are being.
I grew up with a father who very closely resembled a rural version of Archie Bunker. We disagreed about almost anything related to politics. The only small but of overlap was because he had daughters and he wanted all of his children to have access to things he could never have dreamed of achieving. So while from my male classmates abd an occasional teacher, I heard a constant stream of ‘girls can’t do math/play sports/blahblablah, at home, I heard nothing but: You can do anything you want if you’re willing to work hard for it—something that my parents never heard, and frankly something that was not really true for them.
It got worse as we both grew older. In fact, Dad had been dead a number of years before I learned that he tried out some of his racist crap on my adolescent kids. Out of my hearing, or my husband’s. Dad was not dumb. When my kids were really young, he made some vaguely anti-Semitic remark when I was down without my husband and I very matter of fact my informed him that my husband’s grandfather was Jewish, which meant his grandchildren were part Jewish and if that was a problem to just let me know. He’d never have to see any of them again. It was understood that I was part of that package deal. I never heard another word because he knew I was not kidding.
That said, I never saw my father treat anyone with less than respect and courtesy, no matter where they were from or what color their skin or what language they spoke. In his late 60’s, he even managed to pick up some Spanish from the crew who re-roofed his house and was very proud of himself when he could use a small bit with them. He was a very smart man who always wanted to learn more—but the circumstances of his life limited what he could achieve and stunted his world view. In most respects, he was intelligent, curious, funny, honest, hardworking and respected these qualities in others. Even those belonging to groups he wasn’t fond of.
Because it really is so much easier to demonize a group than it is an individual that you know works hard, is honest and as fair as they can be.
About most things. Because, unfortunately, we are all only human and all of us have shortcomings and blind spots and prejudices and limitations of our patience and understanding.
So y’all can throw out as many memes as you like. I’m just shaking my head at what weak stuff ‘my side ’ seems to be made of if they are not willing to look for common ground,
I will leave you with this, from Lincoln’s first inaugural address:
“The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely, they will be, by the better angels of our nature.”
I hope we, even those of us who are skeptics and atheists learn to look for our better angels -and those of those we disagree with.
I am in no way suggesting that we should reconsider that it is ok to impose racial segregation, teach religion in schools or force people whose sexuality or identity makes us uncomfortable into hiding or refuse to allow women to make medical decisions for themselves.
I’m saying that there’s a lot we all have in common, a lot of shared goals. We need to focus on that, and build upon that.
If we don’t, it won’t matter very much who wins the next election. We will have lost our country.
www.latimes.com
