I thought I was going to get through this election season - as long and slogging as it has been - without writing about it. Truly. There has been enough written about the 2016 Presidential Election to send into space and convince any prospective aliens to look elsewhere for friendship. Even a takeover would be ill-advised. It's like the entire Planet Earth has contracted a virus. The Incredible Shrinking Intelligence Virus. Warning to all off-planet visitors: you could catch it. It appears to be extremely contagious. Case in point: how did I think I could get away with no article on the topic? Believe me, I have no wish to be thrown in with the rest of the world's writers, each of whom apparently thinks there is something left to be said that hasn't been said yet about Smellection '16. No. I am writing because I have now seen friendships break up, marriages enter periods of silence, and political dinner table debates end in actual, literal tears to a degree I have never seen. People are losing their minds. They seem to have forgotten that after November we will all still be here and somehow or another we are going to have to begin speaking to each other again. Evidently I've had a small case of the Virus - hence my thought that I would not write about this - but herein lies my just-barely-in-time vaccine. I hope it will protect me from any further ravages.
There seems to be no way to successfully navigate a conversation about this election - whether you are ruminating upon the primary season or the upcoming General - without someone involved getting upset. Unless you are in a room of like-minded people, it has traditionally been the wisdom that you will unlikely avoid argument altogether. But this cycle we are encountering a whole new phenomenon. We have now entered a time where even people who agree can't agree. Seriously. It's as if there's been a mandatory arguing synapse imprinted on everyone's brain. Young, old, rich, poor, brown, white, American citizen or not. Everyone has an opinion. And no one is listening to anyone else's. We have reached the crazy point, people. We are arguing even with people who agree with us. Arguing - which is a polite term for the actual phenomenon - seems to be the rule now. Maybe those aliens have actually sent a signal into our brains that orders us to pick a fight with our intellectual allies, because, boy, do I rarely see anyone resolving a discussion about this election process kindly or peacefully. Simply, to me it is emblematic of the fine point the process has put upon what was the inevitable result of the trend our culture has been increasingly supported: I am me and you are you. I'm over here and you are over there. We are separate beings and we are not connected. If you're not with me, you're against me. Furthermore, if you're not me, you're against me.
Preposterous. We know better. We are just frightened out of our skulls. We are frightened because we have allowed the world to become the breakneck, greed-oriented, violence-worshipping, guilt-loving angst pit it has become. There seems to be a challenge in every statement, an argument in every answer. Americans, particularly, seem to have lost a basic sense of forethought in the simplest of conversations, and the big guns - including real ones - come out before smaller ones have been tried. I get to say this because I am an American. But not just Americans are seemingly embracing a culture I would call Extremicism. There is no such thing as a measured or thoughtful answer anymore - we start right out with the insults hurled at full power. And woe to you if you are prone to a calculation toward reticence or caution. Cynicism will take you right out. You will lose your status as kind or careful and be quickly relegated to the land of fence-sitters, wafflers, milquetoasts, and wallflowers. Even worse if you are not possessed of physical beauty. Then you don't even deserve a place at the table. Doubt this last one? How many times has your attention been drawn to Hillary's wrinkles, Donald's orangeness, Ted's ill-fitting suits, or Barack's ears? Tell me, why would anyone mention these, truly, in any intelligent discussion? Answer: they wouldn't. People can't help what they look like and acceptable taste in clothing is a broad spectrum objectively. This type of discussion arises because people retreat to the lowest common denominator when they are filled with loathing. I guess the question here is: why is loathing a natural go-to in politics, anyway? Hm. More on that later.
Actually, more on that now, and then a little bit more of it later. Loathing is now a trend. You are nobody if you don't hate someone. There's no "I'm not sure I agree with that" or "huh, let me think about that a minute." There is certainly no lowly "you are entitled to your opinion" or "let's agree to disagree." Pfft. You are either a patriot or an America-hater (which is a terrible label because it unintentionally includes places like Uruguay and Paraguay, and, really, most of us never give these places a nod or even a thought, much less an opinion, on a day-to-day basis). You are either conservative or you are trash. You are either liberal or you're a racist idiot. Really. Although statistics tell us that historically most elections are won from the middle, I am entirely unsure at this juncture where the middle is, or if we get to include this weird phase in history. It doesn't even matter anymore, because how dare you have mixed feelings or a variety of opinions that are sprinkled along the liberal-to-conservative spectrum. Nope. Big "X" with Jeopardy Survey Says noise. You need to find your spot and stand there so that you can be lauded by some and sneered at by others. You are lucky if most people are indifferent to you, because you will not be washing proverbial tomatoes off your clothes. But woe to you, too, because no one can see you. It is better to be loathed. Bad publicity is better than no publicity.
It's as if our business is not actually to live in joy, peace, compassion, community, and understanding (I leave out the word 'tolerance' because it's so controversial). Heavens, no. Our job is to sell ourselves. To market ourselves so we can get the best price for our services. The most notoriety, the most approval, the most opportunities, the most pay, the most toys, the most friends. Living within your means, accumulation of material goods by the standard of what's actually necessary, and surrounding yourself with relationships that are mutually nurturing? Again, pfft. Worthless. The main thing is to be Admired. Unfortunately, the opposite of Admired is Loathed. And there doesn't seem to be much in between, especially if you are running for office. You're either Bad or you're Good. Right or Wrong. Smart or Stupid. A Saint or a Thief. You can't be just a regular human being with foibles who sometimes changes your mind or learns lessons or admits mistakes (although there are no mistakes; here are only Evil Doings) or has cosmetic surgery or gains weight or wears a summer suit for a press conference (because that is a big deal, people). Oh, no no. You are either on my side or you're on the wrong side. And if it's the latter, I can hate you. Hooray! Because hating is fun. Energizing. Hilarious! And it shows everyone how right I am if I can convince everyone that you are wrong. And being right is the main thing. It is the only thing. Because it means I Matter.
Everyone has at least one Facebook friend with whom they disagree politically, right? I have one particular one. This person will post vitriolic, hateful, nasty (I use these words because there is never anything kind said; only the opposite of kind. No namely-pamby neutral stuff) diatribes (yes. Diatribes. Usually long paragraphs) about the candidate with whom this person most disagrees. But nothing the person writes is about platforms or ideas or statements. Everything is about the candidate personally. The candidate is Vile. Disgusting. Ugly. Corrupt. Evil. Why? Because it is easier to defend an opinion than it is to discuss facts. And don't try a rational argument. If the person is hating on the candidate because the candidate did this or that, then you innocently point out how the person's preferred candidate did exactly the same thing some other time or in some other situation, FB friend's argument will not be about that circumstance (except to say, well, in that case it was fine because it was MY candidate). FB Friend will immediately throw a punch. Insult you as a person. Question your intelligence and impugn your character. Right out loud in public on Facebook. There is no rational argument, because, in the end, anymore, it's not about rational things. It's about feelings, visceral reactions, and hewing to one's goddammit-that's-my-opinions. No thinking. No critical analysis. Just reacting. And a steadfast, Biblical-style belief in the sanctity of all-good or all-bad. And if you don't agree with me where I am right this minute, you, sir, or ma'am, are all bad.
Before I write the next paragraph, be advised that I already know the answer to the initial questions. I'm trying to phrase my thinking as if I haven't already come to my correct, blessed, sacred, and immovable opinions. I mean conclusions. I mean convictions. I mean omniscient knowledge of the facts and their inescapable meaning.
What the heck has happened? Why has this kind of interaction become not only expected as we peruse discourse, online and in person, but downright ok? (Here's the real question) When did we leave behind kindness, respect, and appreciation for the richness of opinion, emotion, and intellectual reasoning woven into the fabric created by a diversity of cultures, personalities, and abilities? (And some related questions...) When did we arrive at the conclusion that a firmly stated opinion is more valuable than the relationships between human beings? When did we decide that a firmly held opinion is more valuable than a provable fact? When did we forget that a belief is something we know and that a fact is something we KNOW?!!!
The answer (as promised): never. People have surely always been ruled by their fear in this way. There have aways been stonings, shootings, and executions based on mere disagreement. There has always been shaming, ridicule, and name-calling in order to discredit intellectual and emotional opponents. If you can discredit your opponents (or eliminate them), you prove that you are right. Then you matter. Then you count and are counted. Then you don't have to be afraid.
Afraid of what, you ask (even if you didn't)?
Of disappearing. Of being irrelevant. Of being shamed or executed yourself. Or, less dramatically, of simply being put in your place and left with no perceived control over where and how you end up.
The thing is, my loves, there is a solution to all of this if we would only look at ourselves from 10,000 feet and see how silly it all is. The truth is, absent a solar explosion, we are not going anywhere. We are still going to be around, no matter who becomes president. And we are still going to live in each other's neighborhoods, whether that means down the street or on a web page. So we need to start getting along, because in the end, that fear we have, about being irrelevant? It is never going to go away. It's part of accepting that we are in these fragile human packages. Until we are enlightened enough to discover that we are just vibrations, just energy, just love, and that bodies mean nothing (yeah, that's another post or a thousand), there is going to be fear. And the only antidote to fear (namby-pamby, wishy-washy, flower-childy, and pretty-picture as it sounds) is love. Yep.
You know how I refused to mention tolerance earlier? Yeah. I did.
Tolerance isn't accepting cruelty and irrational, unkind behavior. It doesn't mean holding all policies as equal no matter what their effect on others. It means accepting others along with their variances of ideas, thoughts, feelings, and filters as doing the best they can with what they have. Just like you and I are doing. It is recognizing that everyone has something to contribute and no one is to be thrown away. It is understanding that just because I disagree with you doesn't make me valuable and you trash. It is not only forgiving someone's shortcomings but actively looking for something good in someone else. I promise you, there is always something. And if you have already concluded, before looking, that there isn't, then the problem isn't with them. It's with you. And that problem is fear.
This election has circled and swirled almost without departure around fear. No wonder. We have collectively allowed our culture and society and nation to get where it is. I'm not talking about blame. I'm speaking of responsibility. You can't lay the reasons for where we are at the feet of one person, or even one congress, or one court, or one party. If you have been alive, you have been part of the trajectory. Maybe you have become more and more fearful as you have watched the trappings of your life shift and flatten in the wind that you have helped blow by voting (or not) the way you have, by accepting what you have been told by people whom you believed because what they said sounded comforting or familiar, or by buying the idea that the gain of one necessarily comes at the expense of another. Maybe fear has become a habit. You are afraid that things will change. Or that they won't. And your decisions have been guided by that fear.
I am guilty of doing all these things too. Over and over I have forgotten that love is the most important thing. It is the only thing. It really will solve everything. But, boy, are we a long way from it in so many parts of our existence. For instance, does hearing "love solves everything" make you scoff? Doubt? Laugh? Then you have just proven my point. We are so habituated to fear that we think it's the right answer! But look where it's gotten us.
It's like continuing to eat a diet based solely on potato chips and soda and wondering why you keep getting sick. Der.
A person is more than the sum of his or her actions. A candidate is more than a projected image or the party with which he or she stands.
Message to those aforementioned aliens: we really aren't this awful. We really don't relish fighting and spending our energy on hate and acrimony. We really do want to find the commonalities and connections among and between ourselves. We have just forgotten how to do it, and we are so afraid of how we appear that we refuse to try because we might look weak. We are so attached to our loathing and our projecting and judging that we wouldn't know love from a stranger if it hit us in the face. And if we did, we'd slap handcuffs and an assault accusation on it so fast our heads would spin. We are working on feeling the love - read: friendship, community, fellowship, neighborliness - from the people we know. Let us get that concept first. Then prepare to be dazzled, because we really do feel bad when we dislike each other. That's why we even HAVE that word, "dislike". Someday, we will decide to like each other again. If we ever did. We Earthlings may have a virus, but we are searching - haplessly, at times, yes, but still - for a cure.
