Dude. What the fuck? You, some of the local intellectual elite (and this is a pretty intellectual forum), are going to fight over politics? Are you crazy? I get it. Life might start to suck for you like I could never imagine. I don't know the whole situation, but from what I've skimmed over at kleinbl00's Hulk-level-angry comments, the country isn't falling apart and your lifes aren't in danger. So what the fuck are you involving yourself at? Why are you fighting over political differences in a place that's all about learning and treating each other with respect and dignity? Sure. It sucks. It's fucking terrible, the way things are going to happen out there. I hope I don't come off as condescending (there must be a better word for what I'm trying to say) just because I'm on the other side of the planet. I feel you. But. Why are you playing "us vs. them" when working together is the thing you need the most? Notice the extensive formatting? Remember how I barely ever use it? > You guys got what you wanted. > Some of us are seeing our tax dollars flow into your redneck states. For fuck's sake. Shitty hand's been dealt, and trust me - I've felt it all the way down here. Work with it. Work around it. And it's not like you've lost whatever skills and capabilities you've had before the wig hit the fan. So what the hell is stopping you from having a discussion NOW?
Excellent question. And the simple answer is, exhaustion. I've spent my entire life - since I was literally a child - working for equal rights for everyone; women, minorities, religions, disabled, artists, weirdos, etc. I just think every person has value and merit and equal protection under the Constitution. It's really simple: All men are created equal. That they have certain inalienable rights... I grew up in Los Angeles, and my family had to move because the smog was so bad there were whole weeks where we weren't allowed to go outside. Fighting hard against big businesses that didn't give a shit about the air, water, environment, or Earth, we fought for decades, and now Los Angeles has clean air, cars around the world have such low emissions levels that we had to invent new devices to sample them, and people everywhere enjoy environmental expectations of clean water and air. Women are now found in every single job, at every single level, and are respected for their minds, and not just their arm-candy value. Women get intelligent, science-based health care, in clean clinics, where their procedures are medically recognized, refined, standardized, and paid for by their health insurance. People can let their fashion freak flag fly, and get jobs, and not be discriminated against in the workplace. People suffering in other countries can come to America, take a vow, and become American. There is no other country in the world where you can become one of them. America embraces everyone with a shared set of values, and provides a path forward for those whose countries or societies prevent them from succeeding on their own merit. And on, and on, and on. THESE are the values I have fought for my entire fucking life. And every single one of these values was repudiated, spat upon, and openly mocked on November 8th. The smallest, most scared, most base, most hate-filled platform won easily. So fuck all of America between the Cascade Mountains and the Appalachians. It's my liberal, west coast, high tech salary that pays the taxes that keeps those motherfuckers in corn subsidies, welfare, food stamps, and provides the roads and bridges they drive on to go to their Klan meetings. The nipple they suck is MINE. So fuck em. No more freeloading off me. They voted against everything I believe in, and have worked for.
You're not going to give up on most of your life's work and ideals just because the election system in the US is screwed up, are you? 'Cause Hillary won the popular vote. I get it. It's depressing to this this kind of result take place. It's depressing to even see Donald as a candidate. But. You've fought hard for the freedom the US provides. You've said it yourself: you're an American. You're proud of being a part of that wonderfully-inclusive system. You've put effort to make it more inclusive, which is amazing. Will you really give up on that? Democracy is meant to represent everybody, saint or devil, good person or an asshole. That's what partaking in democracy means: to represent the people, whoever they are. You are the people. kleinbl00 is the people. rd95 is the people. Barack, Hillary and Donald are the people. Those guys, redneck Klan members? They're the people, too. They, just like you, have the right to be represented and their votes - counted. It would be nice to create a system which would only be operated by the morally right people, by the good people - but it's not possible. We have to include everybody or embrace that some people are better than others - and we both know that's not true. History has seen many examples of elitism of various groups of the exclusion of particular ones; none ended well. Look at the numbers. Popular vote: Donald - 62,513,667 / Hillary - 64,818,930. That's a shit ton of people voting for Trump, but - Hillary still won the popular vote. That tells me that there are people who can lead this country into a better future (as a people, not through a particular person). It's a shame their votes were ultimately in vain due to the way elections work in the US, but to me, it's a sign that there are reasonable people who care. But there always are. I know it might be aggravating to think about right now, but Trump's victory doesn't mean that those reasonable people have lost. If villains were ever to win, we'd live in a very, very different world right now, because there were always some bad people at the wheel, even in the US. But the truth is, there are no villians: there are only obstacles to overcome for people like you - for people like us, who would like to see this place better when we leave than when we came. You've done your part, and you've done it well. But does it mean you will stop fighting now? __________________________________________ P. S. So, apparently, kb has blocked me again. I don't care much, but these games get tiresome. kb: I wasn't talking to you. I was talking to goobster. I don't care about what you think on the state of American politics right now: you're so damn winded up that I could launch cows at walls off you, Medieval style. You don't like my style? Boo hoo. rd95 was right: get a grip on the shit that's going through your head before it goes too outside of your skull. People respect you highly here, and you going on a rampage in the comments isn't good for anyone. Find a constructive output to your anger. Somebody has to say it to someone who always has something to say.
You know I love you, man, and I truly enjoy hearing your perspective on the US, as a native Russian. Yes it does. For one simple reason, that I have harped on again and again and again: The Supreme Court. The Republicans blocked Obama's Supreme Court nominee because it would have provided a balanced Court. Now a genuine sociopath is going to appoint between 1 and 4 justices to the Court, and his handlers and advisors are chomping at the bit to get their highly politicized appointees in those seats. Which they CAN do, because our tri-cameral system has failed. The idea is that the Legislative, Judicial, and Executive branches of the government balance each other out, so none of them can tilt the scales too far out of whack. There are checks and balances. Unfortunately, activist anti-Constitution Republicans now control the Executive and the Legislative branches completely, and are about to appoint the people who balance the Judicial branch. This is a problem because they can appoint literally anyone they want to without any argument or opportunity for any vetting by anyone else. The system has broken, and now there are three human beings who will determine how all law enforcement happens in the USA for the rest of my lifetime. And all three of these people are publicly on record as being diametrically opposed to everything I stand for. Here's a look at how the Supreme Court can become a political tool of the Republican party within the next six months. The decisions this new Supreme Court will be tasked with hearing, will be defined by a stack of Republican-backed "test cases" that they have had sitting on their desks, waiting for a "friendly" Supreme Court to hear. The man behind many of these test cases - a single, individual lawyer, who will decide how law is enforced in the US for the rest of my life - is a conservative Christian Texan lawyer who believes the US is suffering god's wrath because of fags. (My shorthand interpretation. But you can listen to an easy-to-consume podcast on Edward Blum's history with test cases and the Supreme Court.) THAT is why I am done helping. The game is over. We lost. I just don't have the energy or soul left to fight all these battles again. I know it might be aggravating to think about right now, but Trump's victory doesn't mean that those reasonable people have lost.
Well, I can see how it can be tempting to lay your arms down. It's certainly appalling, the way things went and promise to go still. I can't blame you for feeling defeated. I'll just say this. If it was ever true that people could lose, we'd still live in tribal system, if that. In my naive idealism, I see it as just another step on the path of history - an unpleasant step, one we'd all would've liked to avoid in the first place, but a step nonetheless. Perhaps you're the person who'd understand me best when I say that there are no failures or successes - only the ways turn out, for better or worse. To lay down or to keep going in the face of adversity is a choice everybody makes, and I can't blame you for feeling like it's your time to step away from fighting. It's a tough battle, it's exhausting, it's aggravating, terrifying, sometimes all at once. But I don't feel like you've lost. Not it the sense of "There's nothing that can be done", anyway. Maybe you're right in thinking that it's not your fight. But please, for the love of all good and holy: don't let good people suffer as a result. It's enough that about half of the US has to go through every day with the notion of "President Trump" on their shoulders already. Please, don't let this turn into a fight among people who are already suffering from fear, anger or lack of strength.The game is over. We lost. I just don't have the energy or soul left to fight all these battles again.
You're missing the entire gist of the discussion - that somehow, issues with the Democratic party in Appalachia are the problem of the Democratic party elsewhere, and that obviously, the Democrats would have won if only they considered sucking redneck white boy cock. This is a trope that has been trotted out since Dukakis. The fact of the matter is, Appalachia voted for Democrats when Democrats were all about keeping Darkie down. But since LBJ and the Civil Rights Act, Appalachia has been about whoever will keep them ahead of the Negros. And nothing else fucking matters. Demonstrably. Over the past 50 fucking years. Edit: don't block someone first and expect to not get blocked in return. PS. Take your meds.
I get that that's the message in all of these pieces but a lot of the pieces that I've read were written by those coastal elites - so it's more your peers pointing to problems in other places instead of us saying you abandoned us. In my boots on the ground opinion (and I'm mixing several responses in one so forgive me if this is tangential to this thread), you're right, you're not responsible for us. It's not your duty to send us money, it's not your duty to spend your time, and it's not your duty to bus down here and make change. Because I do believe that even the liberal among us are still states rights people, and it's our duty to make our states right. Now, we still have a lot of racists and bigots and close minded people around here - I hang out with them every holiday - and we know that their stances run deep. But they share our blood and we share their history and our salvation is tied up in one another. It's why we like our bibles down here - we're a nation whose tradition of division and hate is so deep in our being that the only solution is to be born again wholly in love, and we'll latch on to whatever we can to help show us how to do that. So, that's my ramble.
This is due in no small part that the educated and people of means tend to migrate from the country to the city. It's a trend that dates to the introduction of cities. As listed above, the trend/trap of homeownership has increased the static friction of the nomadic American workforce; one must have more means in order to relocate than before, which has caused a greater number of people to be trapped. Consider: all the migrants photographed fleeing the Dust Bowl were people who had nothing to lose. We now have an entire generation of homeowners who may or may not live near work. And many of these people do not view their homelands as irredeemable shitholes. I grew up in rural New Mexico and I have plenty of acquaintances still there who think it's awesome, that everybody there is awesome, and life is good... despite the fact that whenever I head home I get to hear about another murder-suicide. Thus, we get these narratives about how "the heartland" isn't an irredeemable shithole because not everyone had a terrible childhood and the loss of the family farm and the vanishing way of life of the coal miner because people want to have their cake and eat it, too - they want their Whole Foods and Pottery Barn lifestyle to be amenable to Walmart and Winco. And sure. On one side it is. If it weren't for the fact that I'm now staring down the barrel of Betsy De Vos as Education Secretary, for example, I'd have no animosity for them. But I know down to my DNA that they don't think their salvation is tied up in me.I get that that's the message in all of these pieces but a lot of the pieces that I've read were written by those coastal elites - so it's more your peers pointing to problems in other places instead of us saying you abandoned us.
I forgot about the housing, that was interesting to learn. I'm pretty relentlessly optimistic - also relatively young - and my area is appalachia and not the heartland, but I don't think they're irredeemable. I suffer no illusions that change will come quickly or be embraced without trouble, but my state was once deep red and now runs as a swing state, so can't help believe change is possible - if not exceptionally slow. And yeah, I've met plenty of people who don't get shared salvation - church going folk who chant that they are full of sin but still think they're on moral high ground - and I don't expect much from them. But there are all kinds of people down here who get it and so many of them are out there talking to each other, having this conversation about what it will take to create unification and understanding. I don't know, I'm just hopeful. There was a lot of anger in this thread, so if someone made it this far I just wanted to share that with them.
Believe it or not, I'm hopeful, too. This style of thinking, though, is hopeful in the wrong direction. If we all hope that the Democratic Party will somehow triangulate towards a direction that will attract the Confederate flag-waving, church-voting, outsider-hating ruralist vote despite their utter failure to do so since '68, then we will be disappointed over and over and over again. If we instead hope that those who are most impacted by the regressive policies of the Republican Party on their home states rally to defend themselves, the result is likely to be a lot more lasting. My wife was broken up on election night. She wished she could have done more. She regretted not, for example, traveling to the Midwest to speak the good fight for Clinton. I looked at her and said "You don't really think they'd listen to YOU, do you?" Hillary Clinton carpetbagger has a disturbing number of hits.
Oh sure, but that's the shared salvation thing - the "Confederate flag-waving, church-voting, outsider-hating ruralist" aren't really synonymous with the "love your neighbor" crowd so I don't think they're coming over any time soon, but there are a whole lot of people living in the grey who want to sit down and find a better way.
Thanks! My wife does this thing where she kills herself to make other people happy. She tells herself that it's worth it, that she's making someone else's day better and so I always ask her, "if you're making someone else happy at the expense of your own happiness, what's the net benefit to the world?" That's the salvation thing - if the effort of saving other people wounds you to immobilization, then is the cost of their salvation too great? To me it is and so we focus on people who understand we all must rise together - and if you have to take a step back to rise up, then that's what must be done. Sorry, that's lecture-y. I'm probably writing that more for the wife than for you. With that apology in mind I'm going to continue to lecture because I've been listening a lot, here and in my own communities, and find it easier to organize thoughts when I write them to someone. We've been talking about this stuff in a lot of my communities. These communities - which generally revolve around service, religion, or southernness - have a tendency to idealize the values of faith and hope. In these communities I'm trying to give people their time and their space to grieve and come to terms with this new reality, but the optimist in me just want to grab them and slap them and wake them up to the fact that they just got everything they've been praying for. Those that ask for faith have been given such massive doubt that the only option they have at this point is to believe in something that seems impossible. Those that ask for hope have been give such relentless despair that only hope can help to prop them up. Doubt is the fire of the forge of faith, despair the fire in the forge hope, and we need clear minded craftsmen who can pull something beautiful from all the fires burning bright. Alright, that last part was a bit over the top, but thanks for reading.