Reflections on a Dark Day

I am dumbstruck this morning, and I am heartbroken. As I did my daughter’s hair for school, she asked why I was shaking my head, maybe thinking it was something she’d said. “I just can’t believe we did this. I don’t know how our country will survive this person.” She looked at me questioningly, and I realized I have to, at least for the moment, talk to her and her sister of normal, immediate things. I can’t have her believing her world is physically collapsing. Because it’s not.

But it does feel like the values of my country are collapsing. I can’t dismiss what’s happened. My country has just elected, to the highest office in the land, a man whose very essence is crass, disrespectful, fear-mongering, and completely blind to the privileges he’s been handed, not earned. This is a man who thinks nothing of ignoring basic civil rules, such as paying the people you’ve hired to do work for you for an agreed-upon price, just because he can get away with it. This is a man who, when given a chance to scale down some of his most incendiary rhetoric, has instead repeated it.

Some speculate that now that the election’s over, he will tone down the crazy-talk, stop the performance, and use the advice of more experienced political supporters to take his responsibility seriously. He will act like someone who is a president for all Americans. I don’t know that this is anything more than hopeful wishing. But for all our sakes, I hope they are right.

What I see is a man who has shown only that he loves–needs, even–to be in the headlines, and will do whatever he needs to to stay there. I see a man who won’t stop the crazy-talk because that talk is who he is. But the fact is, I don’t know what’s going to happen. He is one man, he will be at the head of one branch of government. In a normal world, his impact will be limited (except of course, in areas like foreign policy, where the executive branch has a lot of power). But today, I can’t assure a normal world.

I can be assured that the many good people of this country will act to keep our system of checks and balances in place, will call out fouls when they see them, and that, among the many who are dejected and disenfranchised today, there are millions who will continue to work towards a fairer, more just society within their own spheres of influence. And that I need to more actively be one of them.

Friends have joked with me that it’s time to flee and go back to Australia. But even in Australia, as there was in Britain, in France, and in pretty much every country on earth, there is the dark underbelly. This silent group are the people who are racist, misogynist, and xenophobic enough to vote for the furthest person from Obama they could conjure up and to vote against a woman based on unverified rumors and conspiracy theories.

There is also a second group: the many, many people–people I call friends and acquaintances among them–who allowed fear and ignorance to dictate their vote. Many are intelligent people who are tired of seeing promises not fulfilled by the Washington elite and who are just busy trying to succeed in their every-day lives. But they check their Facebook newsfeeds and listen to the know-it-alls (we all have at least one in our social circles), and they hear the same half-truths and false allegations said with conviction and repeatedly. And so they believe them. And they repeat whatever they heard Susie Q say. And then they vote. To these people I say two things. First, take your responsibility to be informed seriously. Facebook articles are not “the media” and they are not all good news sources. Read a lot, and read real sources. Jo Shmo who wrote some article that he posted on some internet-only site that then posted onto Facebook about [insert theory here] should not be your only source of information. Look at who is writing what you are reading, and what their sources are. Better yet, go to their sources directly. I know you are busy, but it is your responsibility. It is the price you pay for living in this great country.

Second, I say: let’s talk in a year, or two if you prefer. Let’s see which of his promises your choice has managed to fulfill. Those promises, for the record, include most notoriously:

-building a wall on our Mexico border

-repealing Obamacare AND replacing it with another system of healthcare

-overturning Roe v. Wade through the appointment of (a) Supreme Court justice(s)

-eradicating ISIS/ISIL

-protecting existing gun laws, military-grade assault rifles and all

-rewriting our tax code and lowering taxes “for everyone”

Which of these policies, by the way, are you most excited about? And what will you do and think when he doesn’t deliver? I truly want to understand, because without understanding, we will find ourselves in the exact same place in four years.

I am heartbroken today and I am angry. And I fear the damage our president-elect will do before we realize our mistake. But I am also hopeful that out of this election will rise a country who engages, who finds common ground, and who makes decisions with eyes wide open about how we should move forward. Because, despite what happened last night, we are better than this. And if we aren’t now, we have it in us to be.