(First, 178.6. Stuck in a rut. Need a fat fast.)
So, we have a president-elect, and it is a surprise to many. Donald Trump, a man with no diplomatic experience, no military experience, and no political experience, is now the politician in charge of our diplomacy and our military. There's a lot of shock, anger, and sadness floating around on social media right now, as well as a lot of gloating douchebaggery.
I must admit to being surprised at this outcome. I absolutely expected to see Hillary Rodham Clinton as our next president. Trump rattled the establishment and somehow wrangled enough electoral votes to see his way through to the presidency.
Along with the anger, dismay, shock, and sadness I see in people's posts, I also see a great deal of irony. Many of my Clinton-supporting friends are PISSED OFF and looking for someone to blame, someone other than their candidate (who, sorry to say, was not a good enough candidate to garner enough support to win the election). I see people suddenly becoming bitterly intolerant, telling those who supported Trump and even those who voted for third-party candidates to "fuck off and die". I suspect the "unfriend" button is getting a workout today. Pretty ironic for a group of people who have been railing against the bitter intolerance of the Trump supporters for the entire campaign.
I understand, there are many people truly terrified at the outcome of this election. My friends in the LGBTQ+ community are worried about the status of their relationships and their lifestyles (to say nothing of their lives in some cases). I have friends with medical conditions, serious ones, who have come to rely on Obamacare for their insurance. They worry, with good reason, about what will happen to them if the AHA is tossed aside. I have friends who have experienced racism and sexism because of the color of their skin or their gender, who are afraid that those behaviors will not only continue but will be supported by a president who seems to be guilty of both.
I wish I could tell them that everything will be all right, but I can't. I didn't want Trump to be president.
But, here's the reason I'm backing away from social media for a while...I'm trying to avoid the backlash from all these friends of mine. Because I didn't want Hillary to be president either. I believe that her behavior regarding the emails was not only suspicious but inherently dangerous; she does not demonstrate the level or care and concern with sensitive and classified material that someone in her position should. I do believe that Hillary is responsible for the disaster that was Benghazi. I believe that she actively participated in the coverup surrounding her husband's infidelities. I believe she was involved in the Whitewater scandal. I believe that there is a suspicious trail of deaths of people who potentially could have provided damaging information around her. I don't feel that she was a good candidate for president, and obviously I was not the only one. I chose to vote for a third party candidate, because I believe that our election system is broken and that our two-party system only perpetuates the issues we face.
I heard many people say, "A third party vote is a vote for Hillary" or "A third party vote is a vote for Trump". I disagree. I think a third party vote is for many people either a vote for a candidate that more closely represents the values of someone than the main candidates do or a protest against the system. So many of my friends said, "Protest votes are great, but maybe this isn't the election to do so." Well, to that I ask, When IS a good time to protest, then? Nobody protests when things are going well. You protest when there is good reason to. I think this election shitshow was definitely reason to.
But now I face potential castigation from people because I exercised my right as an American to choose the candidate that I felt more closely aligned with my values. I am a fiscal conservative and a social liberal, like the libertarian party. I don't think government has the right to determine who marries whom or what we do with our bodies. I also think government has gotten us into trouble in the international business community with deals that have harmed our work forces and increased our energy dependency on foreign oil. I think we've shoved our military in places that they did not need to go. I think immigration needs to be reformed (not shut down). So I voted libertarian, and now I may lose friends because of it.
I'm angry at everyone. I'm angry at my conservative friends for not offering an olive branch to people who desperately need one, and at their lack of recognition of the damage that Trump can cause. I'm angry at my liberal friends who were so determined to try to shut down Trump that they were not willing to recognize the flaws in Clinton's candidacy. And I'm angry at all of them for trying to blame me, a third party voter who was trying to do what I felt was best for the country.
I admit to being a social media junkie, but I need to walk away for a little while. I'll acknowledge birthdays and stuff, but I need to stop reading people's posts for a while until everybody calms the fuck down. It will be interesting to see how many people drop me as a friend during that time. My friends are much more intolerant towards others than they think they are, I suspect.
